 This program is brought to you by cable franchise V's and generous donations from viewers like you in the presence of a quorum and calling to order the meeting of the Amherst Pellum regional school committee At 6 31 p.m. on Tuesday March 9th, and we'll start by roll call attendance Please state present when I call your name. Mr. Demling Mr. Harrington Harrington present miss Kenny Kenny present miss Lord Lord present miss Segar Segar present miss Dancer stanzer present McDonald present mr. Sullivan Sullivan present I believe that's all of us tonight. Um, or right now So we're in order and we also have miss miss grip coach our student representative joining us welcome And then we also have a few other guests joining us this evening We don't have any minutes to approve Tonight in our packets. I will move right on to public comment And I believe this for folks watching at home. Oh, we are being live streamed And both on channel 15 and Amherst and on the Amherst media website. Thank you to Amherst media And we are being recorded Did you have a comment mr. Sullivan? I do at 7 o'clock? I'll have to leave for a few minutes to go to a select board finance committee and school committee meeting and then I'll be back Probably 15 or 20 minutes at the max at 7. Okay. Thanks for letting us know And the public comment document if it's not posted already on the agendas page of the regional school committee It will be posted tomorrow And we have no voice comments. So we'll just go straight into the Justice second. We'll try that again. Are folks seeing the document? Okay. Thank you And that is all of our public comment we will now turn it over Next item is our superintendent's update and I also noticed that we had our member miss Spitzer has joined I'm Welcome and then we also have some other Folks from heist from Amherst regional high school that have joined us So I will turn it now over to dr. Morris for a superintendent update. Sure and as I Trying to do lately. I'll try to be brief as possible. I know we have a lot of other topics to get to tonight The first is just an appreciation assistant superintendent during Cunningham has done a fantastic job organizing workshops for our staff from due to trust and others around white supremacy culture and schools and just want to You know, I've sort of mentioned them throughout the year But I probably haven't done a good enough job of acknowledging the ongoing work that Doreen has facilitated and worked with our staff members To do it's been hugely helpful You know, we've our educators Continue to sign up and we continue to find ways to support Our educators in becoming more versed in this being the school district and that lives our values And so Joe trust is one example But he's been someone that has been his work has been tended by many many staff members Throughout the last 18 months And so I just want to acknowledge Doreen and her work on this because I think I do routinely I do updates and this happened that happened but you know, perhaps not as Much as I should in terms of acknowledging Doreen and her team's work on that So I just wanted to do that. I think I've mentioned before that Doreen and I Both participated Through the Minority Student Achievement Network MSAN in a series of workshops by Dr. Darnisa Amante Jackson Who's an educational racial equity strategist? She does a lot of work with culture innovation and adult development Her focus isn't actually on students. It's on the adult to work with students And that's been hugely helpful for Doreen and myself around leader equitable leadership practice She's the CEO of what's called the deep or disruptive disruptive equity education project She also works at Harvard and so I just wanted to pass along some of the the good work that's going on in terms of professional development of adults And thank Doreen for her leadership in that area We'll talk about this a little later because it's sort of connected to an agenda item And I think while not anticipated for 48 hours I think it'd be hard pressed to assume that no one will respond to this but this afternoon at 145 We got some pretty significant and unexpected guidance from the department From of education here in massachusetts As this is a regional meeting we'll only talk about the regional implications So I just want to acknowledge that and it will directly affect the Conversation we have a little later about in person return at the high school And we may want to think a little broader about that but that was not some of it was expected We did not I did not and I think superintendents did not expect There are secondary implications that were in that document So we'll we just got it this afternoon. I can't say that I'm an expert and read through every page in detail But it certainly has lots of implications for us. I wanted to to share that Want to acknowledge that this uh except for my column folks friends who have a meeting thursday This is the last meeting we'll have before the one-year anniversary of when we shut down schools on the 13th And uh, you know, we we actually talked a lot at the district level about how to You know, we thought about ways that students could maybe honor celebrate things that they've Learned over the last year and where we struggled is this has been a really hard time for a lot of people I think a lot of people you all know me. I'm a silver linings person So, uh, I could describe the good things that have happened and they've been many but for some of our families for firms Some of our students. This has been uh trauma upon trauma And so we decided to have a more um quieter You'll see something in the newsletter on friday that just acknowledges the day I was sharing with some folks before the meeting that um Yeah, I went back and watched the video that dr. Gabbara and I did to share the news that we were closing for at least two weeks Uh on mark 13th last year and it captures a different tone Um, and it did bring me back to that place and I think it is worthwhile for us to reflect on the year not in a glorification or uh, you know demonization but just literally it's been a year on like any other I think everyone would agree with that no matter what folks experiences are and I wanted to acknowledge it here I think mr. Demling mentioned last time. I think this is our 51st or 52nd meeting Uh since that time. So we've been talking a lot about what we're going to do and how we're going to approach things and True to the theme right tonight. We'll talk about some unexpected changes that occurred this afternoon Uh, and that's really probably been the largest theme that we've talked about every time we Think we're moving forward in a certain direction. There's another twist or turn there, uh as well So I just want to acknowledge how much work the committee and the community has done and bearing with the the various alleys that we continue to find ourselves in and and paths to Travel in that certainly been non-linear But I thought it was worth at least making a statement of acknowledging that it's it's been a year And it's been a lot of meetings a lot of work by people on this call a lot of work by staff members of every single role in our district I want to mention that food service surpassed the 200,000 meals mark They've served 200,000 meals in the last year Within the community and there's some of the in-person stuff for the distance learning centers But predominantly in the community and so The amount of work that we go that we think about, you know, is really at every every sector of our organization People have put in tremendous work, you know, you think about it And I'll I'll say it even though it's a regional meeting that tremendous amounts of work has been done on our buildings You think of walls that didn't used to be there that are now there Purifiers that didn't used to be there that are now there And I could go on and on and all the work that everyone's done as well as the distance learning We've spent a lot more time on so just want to acknowledge That time frame again not to to glorify or do anything like that But but I think it'd be weird if we didn't acknowledge that have been a year since we closed I want to then go to vaccines a little bit so There's been a myth or a rumor that went on that I was told about yesterday and today That somehow I have organized a vaccine clinic. That's happening at the regional high school For staff. I would love to nothing more honestly than to organize a Vaccine clinic for all of our staff members that we would host I am not a an obtained. I do not obtain vaccine. That's not allowed in my role and You know, I've had many conversations including this afternoon with our health director Emma dragon who's wonderful Um, and she would like nothing more. She sees the value in educators being vaccinated Just the same way. I think everyone in this call would The reality is that she's getting roughly 250 Doses a week to cover anyone in the state could sign up But it's primarily for folks east in eastern hampshire county not just for the community of amherst That 250 doses includes people who people's need for second shots So that's not 250 new people getting vaccinated a large part of that is people getting their second dose So at this point, she's not getting the supply Uh, so at this point, she's not getting the supply Uh, and there's a lot of rules and laws that she couldn't just make of educator clinic. Um as a regional site So that's a huge frustration of us. But what we have done is tried to put resources together Um to try to help staff who are interested in getting vaccinated with the complex web of our systems right now in the commonwealth of Massachusetts of how to receive a vaccine Right before this meeting started. I sent an update Because it was a time change in one of the sign ups For vaccines and we're trying as best we can to help educators With what they can do to get in the queue I wish it was a more straightforward path. This is another sense of frustration that we've talked about for the last year Is that there's some things we can control and there's some things we can't So the best we can do right now is be sharing accurate information with educators I do know educators have started getting vaccines, you know through the cbs program and other programs the veterans program as well and As of thursday, they're able to anyone who's a school staff member Is that eligible to start signing up on all of the state websites? So that's all been shared with our staff and faculty and staff all the links all the cheats all the text alerts if a opening comes up Which is unfortunately the limit of our capacity right now But I will say personally I am a pro vaccine person I think these will help our staff and our community feel safe And um, we're trying to do everything we can to give our staff as many tools as possible So they can get vaccinated But one of the tools that's not in our disposal is a clinic that we host for specifically for our staff Love to do that. Um, it's it's not yet. It's not right now an option The state did say they're looking at maybe some of their super sites Like the closest one being the eastfield mall and springfield and having an educator or school staff only days When we receive that information we'll be sharing it out with staff members immediately as we happen But I just wanted to clarify someone asked me today if I could clarify Because there's a rumor going around not just Amherst, but the region that that Amherst was having a clinic for educators And I'd love it if that rumor was true, but unfortunately it's not 200,000 meals I think That is The other things I was going to say the more I've thought about them They'll integrate well into the budget presentation and you know talking about the high school schedule So I think I'll I'll stop there and see if there's any questions from the committee Any questions? I'm not seeing any raised hands So, um, I think we're good Are you all set? Okay um So, uh, moving on to uh chairs update. I do not have um an update this evening Um, so a school committee announcements. Are there does anybody have an announcement they would like to share? I'm not seeing any last call Okay, moving right along um This never happens We are I'm sure we'll catch up. Um, uh, so We are now moving on to our new and continuing business and we will start with the ARHS block schedule for the 2021-22 school year And I will turn it back over to you dr. Morris Sure. Um, and I'm just going to cue this up briefly and I think this part of the um Meeting will not extend beyond the timeline I think you know the intention of sharing about the block schedule for the next school year was to let the committee and the community know about the Incredibly detailed planning. This is a summary document if they wanted to get into the weeds of slides of Exact amount of instructional time and all that they've done that work and you'll see a summary here Uh, but we are planning to implement a block schedule for next year at the high school I want to be clear that this is not a permanent decision. This is related to COVID and COVID safety And then we'll assess we'll reassess and you'll see this in the slides what we want to do long term But it is a significant enough change that we did want to bring it to the community As well as the committee. Um, so you're going to get a very broad overview Of of this and then we'll get into the more deep topic Perhaps given the desi memo About in person for this spring a little later. So just to clarify. This is for the 2021 school year 20. Excuse me 21 22 school year Uh, and it's about the the schedule at the high school and I will run the slides for The high school team if they just cue me on when they want a slide to go But with us tonight is interim principal sadeek um And assistant principals gormacky and cameras. I thank you three for spending time and being here tonight and I will turn it over to you Thank you mike. Uh, i'm mickey gormacky one of the assistant principals. Um, Are the are the slides up? Great. Thank you So again, thank you to the school committee for giving us this time to be able to share what our plan looks like for next year With regard to the schedule It's also an opportunity for us to do our first presentation For the community about this but as we'll talk about at the end of the presentation We will be setting up student and um community forums to to be able to walk people more specifically through this schedule So mike if you could go to the next slide Oh the i'm sorry the rationale. Yep. Sorry the background and rationale Um, so like dr. Morris said it we really are moving into this four by four block next year for a one year schedule With health and safety being the main reason we want to eliminate Or reduce the number of cohorts That students will be in next year at the high school And we think that this is the best schedule that we can move forward with with regards to having a block The next slide mr. Morris the timeline So we started this in december. We convened a committee with a significant cross section of the building Um, we look at we looked at past and present schedules and then updated this as t and l which stands for teaching and learning Um on this slide, you'll also see the folks that are in this scheduling on this scheduling committee In february we gathered feedback from the full faculty and staff about the proposed schedule and adjusted it with their Feedback and they had an enormous amount of feedback, which was really great. Um, and it really helped us Work on on the schedule itself Um in this month we'll work on the program of studies um Course registration and then eventually finalize the summer school format and offerings And then april and next month we'll do course registration. We'll also host an eighth grade incoming ninth grade family curriculum night In may we'll do course verification And then we'll have the summer to really build the schedule and and put students into their schedules You can move to the next slide Thank you. Um, so while we landed on the four by four block We certainly wanted the committee to understand that we looked at a lot of different block schedules that exist in high schools We looked at three by three. We looked at a three by three plus one, which is what we're doing right now Um, we also looked at obviously the four by four that we're proposing and then also another popular four by four Is the ab block where students have all eight classes and every other day it rotates and obviously if if health and safety and minimizing cohorts was The real goal of moving to this schedule We knew that having students carry all eight classes and therefore be in eight different cohorts was not the way to go Yet it is a very popular block schedule And we were also asked about the trimester and to really look at whether or not that was feasible for next year A lot of a lot of folks in our community remember the trimester and liked it But we felt that because there because we're only doing this for one year at this point That the redesign challenges would just be too great to move back to that schedule Okay, so this is what the schedule The proposed schedule looks like The teacher work day is approximately again these times or estimations depending on the transportation and such 805 to 335 And in the morning teachers will use 805 to 845 for collaboration. We'll also run IEP and 504 meetings faculty meetings and department meetings Now if you look at this table, you'll see we've run a two lunch schedule and a three lunch schedule And there are just a tiny bit different We imagine we're going to end up with a three lunch schedule given The size of the cafeteria and how much outdoor space that we have But we wanted folks to see that we're looking at both of these the school day will start at approximately 905 A period will run 905 10 9 or to 10 25 then b 10 30 to 11 50 C as you can see holds that lunch block in it. So it's 11 55 to either 150 or 155 So you can see those differences between the two and three lunch block We have a d block from two to 320 or 155 to 315 Well, we've added at the end of the day is something that we're calling d plus or we may come up with some other creative term, but this is an opportunity for students to Make sure they have in place all the things they need for their homework that evening Check in with teachers that they may have questions with Or about the school day. It also gives sports teams an opportunity to Go off to practice and to games. There is a chance that sports teams will be missing some of d block But all students will have at least a half an hour in d block Even with those sports games and can plan for the absence and talk to the teacher The athletic director Victoria stewart is going to be communicating with area athletic directors to see if there are options to start games later And to see how we can run that. So this is the proposed block So when we presented to our faculty, we tried to identify what questions might come up and try to answer those in advance So we thought we'd share those with you this evening So there was certainly a question about we thought we anticipated questions about music ensembles And so like most four by four blocks, we will absolutely run Music ensembles all year. That will be the one of the only courses that alternate all year And we know that it's just absolutely necessary in order to um, you know, give high quality music instruction So that will exist in this four by four There's a question about electives And so we know that in the four by four one of the great benefits is that students get opportunities to take more electives So when you think of 16 blocks, right versus the seven that we were running There's actually room for more electives. So we've decided that we will run electives on the 45 day Quarter cycle which will again allow students opportunities for more electives Um, will there be directed studies? So that's something that we've become really used to as a community That's been in all of the schedules. Um for for many many years Um, and what we find is that in a four by four block because students have fewer classes and because those classes are 80 minutes that we really look to Keep their focus on academics and that you build time into the classes for students to be able to complete their assignments So the short answer is we won't have directed studies in this Four by four block schedule students will carry four blocks at a time so Folks may be asking what about academic skills? So for students in special education programs teams are going to need to really decide And determine the services that students require in the block So we will offer academic skills in an 80 minute block But some students may only need a few days of that service in the six in a six day cycle And so we will have to work with teams and families to figure out exactly how much we think students will need Um, we will be running some classes year long So we did a little bit of surveying of the different departments to find out And you know, for example, we'll run algebra one integrated math one topics in math Both ab and bc calculus all year as well as ap physics There will be some courses that will run three quarters of the year since these are essentially quarters I know that folks have been concerned about world language and math and the continuity and the challenges of that with a block The good news here is that we are going to add we're going to allow students to request additional blocks So they could technically double up on those. So we're going to do our best accommodate those requests But we'll see how that goes. That's our hope So if you wanted to double up on math and world language, um, our hope is we can accommodate that So there was some questions about if we move to the block next year What happens the year after that and so we were very clear with our faculty and staff That we acknowledge that there's an moa in place and there's a very clear process to change a master schedule And that we're changing this schedule for next year based on the pandemic and health and safety But we will convene a scheduling committee next fall and we'll we'll reflect on how the block is going And then we will determine whether or not we want to move forward with a proposal for a new schedule for 22 23 Otherwise, we will be going back to the seven drop one, which is the negotiated schedule that's been in place We also are surrounded by many schools in massachusetts that have four by four blocks locally north hampton high schools in a four by four block and Cambridge Ridge and latin is one of the schools that's in a four by four block That's done a really nice job on their website providing a lot of documents a lot of research and a lot of information about the four by four block So we actually used some of their materials as we were developing our proposal for this block so Our next steps in communication our plan is to present it To students to families and to cpac and so we will run forums To do that and gather feedback from students I did see that there was a student group that was hoping That we would be listening to them and and the answer to that question is is yes We will be holding forums for that We're going to go ahead and and publish the program of studies In early april and so right now we're gathering information from departments about the course offerings for next year So that's all Thank you Before I open up to the committee for questions, I do have one I've received this question from other community members And I figured it out eventually I think but can you define What you mean by four by four or three by three? What is what is the four and the by and the four So thank you for asking that I think we get so stuck on scheduling jargon that we forget that the rest of the world Doesn't operate like that. So it's how many courses at one time So right now when we say oh, we're in a seven drop one That means that we have seven courses that students take typically the core academics or the five mass social science English and world language with the other courses being electives And so when we say and and seven drop one means you take seven and each day one drop So you have six at a time So a four by four would be that they it's much like a college schedule So students take four classes in the fall and then they would take four classes in the spring Thank you, and presumably that The class each of the classes similar to what they are experiencing this year would be a full year's worth of curriculum in that one semester Yes, yeah Mr. Deming I just want to say a brief comment that I really appreciate the efforts of the high school admin team This is obviously not something that was on the top of the school committee's radar to figure out So the fact that you started months ago looking at this proactively And now we have the opportunity to implement it in a responsible way that's going to be You know in a co vid safer way with the cohorts for next year is is excellent. So, you know, I really appreciate that and it's I like I like that you've you've bookended it with You know re-evaluating what you want the schedule to be after after this It's it's not often you can make this big of a change Take it for a spin And then have that really valuable lived experience right to like to talk about what what the take-homes are some really interesting opportunities here, I think creative ways to expand electives without straining staff resources too too much You know on budgetary resources were always facing the budget So, you know, it's really nice and it was so great to see Lunchtime as a side effect of the late start scheduled at a normal lunchtime Some of the lunches from before 10 o'clock if I recall sometimes occasionally so Really appreciate the work and I look forward to hearing from you again in the fall on it Miss Seager So I'm I'm curious I'm I'm relatively new to understanding how the high school functions and in looking at the four by four How did the lunches work? Most of the other periods are about 80 minutes. It looks like so If you have three lunches, what are the kids in the middle doing like? How does that class time look in both of the two lunch and three lunch scenario? Yeah, that's a very good question So if you're looking at the two lunch scenario, what that means is that students will be having lunch from 11 You know a third of the For half of the students will be having lunch at 11 55 and the other half at 12 30 And so for each of these the class will run 80 minutes Okay, does that make sense? And in some the way we run lunch now people actually Will leave class in the middle in some cases go to lunch and come back to class Which is why it looks a little bit confusing Miss Spitzer Thanks. Um, I want to echo the gratitude for planning early and um Also, I think this makes a lot of sense to approach a model, you know, that'll minimize the number of cohorts I'm curious, um I know we have a really strong world language program and I think that is one of the classes you called out as Meaning to be kind of really benefiting from continuity over the course of a year So i'm curious could the d plus time be set aside for maybe some language based Like if it's if it's doing has to choose between math and language, I'm just wondering if that d plus time could potentially be used for maybe um remote kind of distance learning center style stuff where students I can understand not wanting to have the in person stuff, but have you could It's been a long game not doing from back to articulating my question But what i'm trying to say is have you looked at kind of non in-person ways of providing continuity for something like a language That might really benefit from having continuity over the course of a year But maybe a student's also really excited about calculus and needs to take ap math I just I know from personal experience that that was one of the Highlights of being a high schooler in amherst and I just love to see um students not have to make Such tough choices and I'm wondering if from some of the learning we've had this year about remote stuff But there might be asynchronous ways or in synchronous ways to get students together to continue building their language skills So we did talk about and you brought you brought up an interesting point So we originally had a schedule That ended up with a half hour at the end of the day And we had all these visions of all these very interesting You know academic kind of pursuits that we could have students do And when we really talked about that with the faculty it became clear that of health and safety was our priority You know releasing, you know upwards of 800 students for a half hour at the very end of the day and expecting them to Get deeply engaged in academics Is what allowed us to go back and actually add more time to the classes Um which left us with some time because we were very cognizant of athletes and other students that that would need to Leave for work or college classes. So we wanted to try and have some time. I think your suggestions excellent I think the world language department's one of the departments that's really grappling with how to do this schedule and how to do it Well, um and most schools, you know, and and mr. Demling referenced it when you change a schedule It's usually a three-year process We're changing, you know, we changed to a three by three in a matter of weeks and we're changing to this in less than a year So I do think you're you're raising a great point And it's a department that that is going to have some challenges figuring it out So so we will certainly share that advice and input and and see what they can make of it I see a couple other hands, but I did have a question sort of that continues Ms. Spitzer's comment You mentioned also about doubling up, um world languages or Or math. What does that mean to double up on a block? So what that would mean is if you were taking french one The first semester you could then possibly take french two and advance yourself Um Does that make sense? Okay Thank you Ms. Kenny I was going to ask the same question. How does the doubling up work? What does that look like rather? So it's it's like us your a period in the fall Or could be french and then your a period in the spring could also be french not french for both a and b period Correct and and we imagine that we you may be able to do that with some with math Right. So if you're really committed and interested in STEM Right again, it may be hard to accommodate given the budget cuts, but it's it's our goal It's something we really would like to be able to do for students Other questions Last chance No, thank you very much for that. That's um and thank you for the uh remedial uh definitions for for me and others And I think so um We'll move on to the next item, which is um We were intending to talk about the in-person model discussion for the spring in light of the school committee action a week ago um, and I think we're we're pivoting a little bit to Talk about implications of the directive that we got from uh desi this afternoon So not sure I I don't anticipate that it will be as fully formed as as maybe it might have been before so But we'll use this time to have that start that discussion Yeah I can I can try to queue it up. Um, so I want to apologize uh to To tallow and mickey and sam who've done a tremendous amount of work and thinking about Uh, the uh the school committee vote recently and how to make that work for the high school And we met yesterday and you know, they sent out their work finishing a document today And then I got the desi piece and we recognized that The the items that the high school was working on not surprisingly don't conform to The desi guidance guidance is Maybe not the right word, but it's on the document that we received today And to summarize the guidance uh for members of the public. It's on desi's website. Um, you know, it's a public document at this point It's requiring all the data is not determined that high school's return High school's open for students for five days a week at some point this spring date to be determined later So a couple challenges with that are And we'll talk through some some larger challenges and and that that the high school admin team will will describe to you But one of the challenges is we're not sure how to conform with To be blunt, there's a misalignment right now between the school committee vote And the desi vote that's not at all a critique of the school committee, but The models that the high school were coming up with were hybrid models That's no longer going to be seen potentially at kosher. And I think you'll hear about this when it's an agenda topic At an upcoming meeting for the middle school as well We want to make one change right so if we're going to go from remote to something and that something is being defined for us currently at the state level It's going to be a tremendous amount of fruitless work I think to try to have a hybrid schedule that's only operational for a couple weeks And then move to something else. I think we organizationally we feel like we if we're going to make a change We're going to make one change this this spring And not multiple changes the desi email was very explicit to say well, there's not a date on the high school You should start planning right now For high school students to be back five days a week There's a number of other challenges that come from that One of which is that to achieve that the desi document Again has some differences from what we've all talked about for literally the last year or pretty close to it about Six feet, you know, the desi guidance is not suggesting six feet Of desk separation for students. It's also suggesting about and we'll we'll talk about this in a second about a different model of responding and supporting students in remote access By not having a dedicated remote teacher, but by either streaming or using google meet For access points. So We're you know, what you're going to hear tonight is a sort of uh, a more intelligent And more detailed a list of concerns and barriers that we're facing But we received this document at 145 today it did meet with Dave sloven who's on the call as well as the the main high school Team a bit this afternoon, but we're certainly not in a place to doing anything more than processing questions In concerns about how to move forward just given the timeliness Of when we received the document and the unexpected nature of it. Um, you know, I was on a statewide conference call last week It wasn't you know a desi call but had a bunch of superintendents on and we were you know explicitly told You know really focus on elementary right now. That's what's coming in the desi document And so uh for two other committees. I think you know that we've been doing that We not that we've been letting not thinking about the secondary But we really focus on the elementary and the five days a week and today's document really threw us for a different place. So Um, if it's okay with the committee, what I'd love to do is invite the high school team to just describe some of the challenges that they foresee this is not intended to be a Collaborative problem-solving meeting. Uh, we're not at a place to even I think engage in that at this moment Uh, we will be well to come back two weeks from now both at all three of our secondary schools and Be able to talk through some of these things but because it was on the agenda We thought it was actually a pretty useful opportunity to be really transparent about some of the challenges that we're seeing at the moment, so um If it's okay with the committee, I'll turn it over to Some of the high school team to be able to describe. What are some challenges? They see as compared to what they were thinking about when we're thinking of a hybrid model Um, should I start with you? Um principal sedeek? Yeah, I'll start Thanks dr. Morris Yeah, so this obviously changes things for us a little bit actually quite a bit So one thing that does stay the same is we plan on sending out a survey the families Families to figure out who intends to come back The thing that will change is kind of description of what they can expect when they do come back to school And what they'll expect that they stay remote So dr. Morris highlighted a few of two of the biggest concerns is The safety of the folks who are going to be in the school and then the change having all the teachers in school will have Then have been doing a good job. I think a great job delivering remote learning So far this year, but there'll be in person Delivering their curriculum to the people in front of them and also Again, we don't have like live streaming equipment in the school So there'll be also those folks at home will be receiving the instruction as well So with the six feet like our average class size is about 20 people And our average class can hold about 16 people space six feet apart So there's no way we'll be able to guarantee That every class students are in there'll be space six feet apart We won't really we'll send out the survey. We'll get a good idea of how many people are going to show up Then we'll really see when they do show up and they're in the classes How many we can fit in do it as safely as possible Some of the other challenges we're starting to think about are really how to deliver lunch safely to everybody We will be springtime warm will be outside as much as we can for our classes and for lunch Again, we have to have alternate plans in case it's raining Or it does get cold substitute teachers For when teachers are out the impacts are going to be a little bit bigger and also teachers who have remote placements because I know you don't want different reasons So figuring out what that will look like I think as dr. Moore said this is the beginning of trying to figure out how to deliver instruction In person it's effectively and safely as possible while also continuing to have quality remote instruction happening So we'll have a more thorough We'll have some more details about what the plan is in a couple weeks this is Kind of where we're at right now the very beginning plan Yeah Could I add to principal sadeek into your description? I think that was really helpful Just for people who may have more elementary knowledge One of the challenges at the high school is we can't simply add another section of third grade so to speak to space out students it's Teachers when you're in a secondary schedule It's not possible to add sections in the same way. It's not easy at the elementary level, but it's feasible But you know, it's not something that we can do and while the average class has is 20 You know, I wonder if to halber one of your teammates can tell me what's some of like our largest classes How large would they run? That are in a typical class. I don't mean auditorium classes, but just in typical classrooms What would be a large class at our high school? So we we have several classes running with 25 like that's not uncommon at all And that doesn't include things like ensembles and you know But we're just talking about regular academic courses. We have several that are running at 25 Right. And so, you know, it's not just that oh, well, you know, some kids won't come back at all work out We really can't guarantee six feet if we're moving forward with this Um, we can't you know simply add sections to that So I just wanted to stress that, you know, I think everything the principal sadeek said is true and I appreciate Um, you know describing some of the challenges You know, and I think, you know, all of us have sort of mixed feelings about this on one hand, you know Every educator in the district misses seeing students that I will say definitively absolutely That our educators want to be with students I think the conditions at the high school level, you know create some challenges in terms of You know concerns that have been expressed. I think you've all heard me say multiple times and Hasn't always made people happy But I'm going to say it again that, you know, our president and others have really focused on k-8 Uh, and I think that that's for a couple good reasons Not that we don't care about our high school students, but they focus on k-8 being in person based on their read of Kind of science and some concerns about bringing large groups of high schoolers in Um, at the same time, we have some students who are struggling. They're really feeling isolated They're feeling distance from Their peers and adults. Um, and I think like much in the pandemic there There's not a great solution and I think one is being a solution is being forced on us To be very blunt about it. It's um, this particular solution is not coming from the school committee It's not coming from anyone in this room Um, but you know as I read it the stakes are really high in terms of non-compliance um, so, you know one of our larger meta challenges is Um, I'm not sure and I would say it's honestly pretty unlikely. We'd be ready to go five days a week Uh on the date the school committee voted Um and the school committee, you know voted for high school students to be back And I want to say the school committee voted that without the knowledge that we would be returning in five days a week We talked about two days a week and and coming back in different hybrid models So we're having both organizational challenges in terms of, um The new information and a surprise mandate. We're also having trying to meet the, um The expectations of the committee, um and with this new information. That's that's a different thing for us to try to Sort through what's the local guidance and you know in the past bluntly the committee has thought really strongly about some of the pieces that Mr. Sadiq Suggested might be compromised in this model. So, you know, I think, uh You know I don't know more to say except to explain, you know more stress more Some of the challenges and guidance that we'll need not necessarily tonight I don't expect the committee who received the document A couple hours ago and may or may not have a chance to look at it because you all have Um other things that you do in your life other than your Roll the school committee members don't always feel like that. I'm sure but that is uh, I know that your reality as well um Mickey sam top anything else that? um We're missing in terms of Some of the barriers One of the things that I didn't mention before is begin with more students in schools and we had planned to have April The passing periods too were quite a challenge. It's going to be Trying to get students from one class from another as safely as possible Yeah, oh and that actually uh, you you prompted me on something we talked about earlier Which is right now our intensive needs distance learning center is at the high school Um and taking a significant amount of real estate and for good reason um But we we you know, we may have to think about When we were thinking of a hybrid model, we were trying to think about, you know, can we How can we manage that and not disrupt students who are being well served in that model and um Maintain distancing particularly as some of the students in that program Um, the distance is more important because mask wearing is a challenger is impossible based on disability So we have some space challenges as well that come along with having lots of students come back I know Dave sloven who's on this column was going to speak to some of the academy And he just lost internet at his home. So he is apologizing, but hopefully we'll be back on he lives in one of our four member towns And I think this gets it some of the challenges that we have sometimes in our member communities About staying connected as well this way. There's Dave Is it okay if I just ask Dave if he wants to jump in miss mcdonnell before we open up for questions and comments Dave if you're if your line is stable enough and you want to speak to any of the aspects of summit academy You're welcome to but if your line is is Yeah, I will find out It's it's jumping in and out Um everything that the high school is going to deal with we'll probably be dealing with but one of the things that Right now, which has been great is that when we did have students back We uh, we're able to use a few of their rooms and I don't know if that's going to be We're going to be able to do that. Uh, we're certainly looking forward and want our students who want to be back um and need to be back and so You know, those those are our challenges. I I think if we lose the space then I think You know, the six feet is is going to be a challenge because currently a couple of our classrooms just don't allow for For that to happen. And so, you know, I I don't know if Tal if you had principal said if you had talked about it, but just even the custodial work I don't need to be happening is is not simple but But those are the things that I think jump out at me. We'll be trying to get outside just like the high school But I'm hopeful that It the numbers will be The workout and the cafeteria is an issue too because we could only house what we figured was about seven kids In the cafeteria, but that's we know we can we can work through that So, you know, if there's comments questions thoughts ideas We're open to anything here and and certainly I'll always offer the invitation for miss group co as As a high school rep if she's any thoughts to please feel free to jump in on this as well Not to put her on the spot as I always do, but I'll just figure I'll say it at the beginning So she's less on the spot This time around but you know, again, this is all new information and we're trying to process it live in real time Um, and you know just with the nature of the agenda not having this committee meet again for two weeks We thought it was wise to at least Have this, you know open dialogue tonight and come back in two weeks with some more more to clear thoughts Thanks. Um, I you mentioned um That earlier that there's pretty significant consequences And I think knowing that probably a lot of the public hasn't had a chance to read that Could you describe what those consequences would be? Yeah, yeah, so As I understand them And my day didn't stop when the memo came in. So, um, you know If i'm wrong, I will correct myself publicly at the next meeting One of the consequences for day any day where we're not offering five days of instruction would be that we'd have to add a day To the next school year to make up the lost time on learning Which is Not free. I'll just put it that way So it would have major implications. There was some notation That was um implied a chapter 70 funding Penalty although it wasn't explicitly labeled Uh, or explained in that um memo. I have a meeting with the superintendents have a meeting with the commissioner tomorrow I'm sure we'll hear much more On this topic. Um, and there is a waiver process But I think it was really clear and important to note that the waiver process was about Minor or temporary delays not not doing it. Uh, they're really clear about that and also that waivers, um Could not be based in needing to distance at six feet. That was the waivers who Uh, described that their reason for the waiver as not enough space Uh, would have to prove that there wasn't enough space at three foot distancing not a six foot distancing Um, is that if anyone else read it and saw it differently than me I'm open to that. I I can't claim that I'm an expert on the document. Just yeah You're muted miss mcdonald. I think yep. Thank you. Sorry. Um, I think said another way is um There is no option um for us um about whether we do this or or how we meet like there's no flexibility really in this directive um and Um as as as noted sort of another side conversations before this it also is not something that's subject to local local public health either. Um, so to be very clear, this is um a state directive Um by which our district has no option to On on whether we try to comply or seek waivers, um The I had another question now. I forgot that I saw that miss dancer. Oh, I was going to say it seems my internet also might be a little fuzzy because um, You all disappear every now and then so if you do have a question Please use the raise hand function because that does show up even if I can't see your face So this dancer you had your hand raised earlier. I did but um It's been addressed. I I just thought it was important for the People viewing this to understand what the directive was Thank you Mr. Deming Yeah, so, uh, this is a lot to digest in the last four or five hours. So I will grant you that um A couple of the things that um stood out to me as I read through the guidance one is that They emphasized that the requirement isn't just for Five days in person. It's for the full Time on learning. So it's it's I believe at the region. It's five and a half hours Which which may cause us to have to look at our start and end times Um, it also emphasized in person instruction Not just that you're in the building and so this would disqualify our distance learning center model as as qualifying for that time It um It while it did say that I'm sorry while it did not have dates for the high school. It said Oh, we'll get those to you and we'll try to give you at least two weeks notice Which is one of the funniest parts of the whole oh two weeks. That's great. Well, thanks. Thanks a lot, boston You know, we'll throw this all together in two weeks. So, you know, so obviously my first comment then on that is um, we need more than I'm sure everybody agrees with this We need more than two weeks to plan for the high school return for a responsible high school returns responsible and safe and so Um, so we can't wait until desi Decides to give us a date. I feel like we need to proceed post haste into what we are required to do and um You know, I understand that this bumps up against the six foot minimum distance that we've um committed to for the year and um, but I I think I think dr. Morrison mcdonald's have Have made this point kind of clear and people should read this document because there is More bolding and underlining than probably in any other short page document. You've ever seen in your life It's extremely clear that the state's position is that they have the authority to do this. It is it is an edict um, and they were there will be no exceptions um, and so You know, well one could still question that Well, what if there's legal challenges in it? Well, what if anything right? We sort of my my feeling is as a school committee You know, I'm I'm always willing to advocate. I'm going to fiercely advocate. I hope people know that about Um, but I'm not willing to be brazenly illegal And this is really clear that the state is telling us this is your only legal option. And so um I we have no choice. We have no choice but to proceed If responsibly to implement the plan As they're requiring us to do and and it's and like you said, it's very clear that there are no exceptions for six feet there are no exceptions for community spread or local health assessor health condition assessment um And so um, so to that, you know, and a bit of feedback is I'm not comfortable waiting two weeks to talk about any of this again um Especially for seventh and eighth grade which which is supposed to be back on um seven weeks from now and on um My April 26th and that does have a date in this document. I think it's April 28th. If I'm not mistaken for for seventh and eighth Um, so, you know, so that's five days full time in person the full day By April 28th for the middle school I I'm not sure we can go two weeks without talking about that the school committee even if it's a short It's region item. That's just kind of my feeling. Um, so, you know, um, it it's obviously not what any of us plan for or wanted um, but I feel like, you know, we can only deal we can only Uh respond to the cards that are in front of us and these this is a pretty clear limited strong Direction that we have to respond to and it's better to try and plan it Seven ish weeks then then, you know to futz around and I'm not suggesting it by saying futz around You know then to wait until desi gives us a firmer deadline. So this is my initial And miss spitzer Thanks, um, I think much of what I was thinking was actually articulated by uh, mr. Demling, but I I guess I did want to confirm like the distance learning centers models that we've been using which I think have been excellent are not going to qualify qualify and then also this this question about full time I I think we're using a hybrid model across Technically we're using a hybrid model across all of our districts. Um, not just the region all of the districts for which I am A member of so I know I can't talk about that but I'm curious if we've If this document provided a firmer definition of what full time means like is it will they give us wiggle room if we're five days a week in person or are we really going to need to be Doing going returning to our full day and typical schedule even though I know in the our MOA has Other Statements about the length of time and obviously like that if this is the new legal document like this is probably what we need to follow um And it just I guess I'm just going to say I'm frustrated with the unfunded mandate to have um six, you know go from um You know say that six feet is no longer needed if you look at the cdc CDC guidelines when you don't have six feet they talk about all things like plastic barriers and all of these things that we should be Um, which costs a lot of money and the other option is, you know Having more teachers and things like that that might be necessary. So I'm just I want to express my frustration both at the lack of Notice and also the lack of you know attaching any real support for school districts dealing With that this really big challenge Yes, so if I could respond to that a couple of things from the spitzer I think the first thing is on the time we are still looking at that Uh, I won't speak to an elementary issue, but you know, we're trying to look about how we code time and you know It's the number of hours per day of instructional times a little different than The year long that they put in so we may not have to go to traditional schedule But we still have to provide teacher preps and all those things that will make it challenging to go to a traditional schedule With our staffing that we have uh for the school year. So we're actively looking at that and I want to share You know what you said you feel frustrated, you know, I think it came through in my perhaps my tone feel incredibly frustrated Um, you know, there's more guidance from this document coming in the next couple days or in the next couple weeks Uh, if you look in the document, it says more is coming. So, um, you know, I remain Uh jealous of states that came out with guidance documents in the summer and then have made edits over the course of the year um, we've received, you know A number of six to 20 page documents of guidance and we just keep collecting them and collecting them and it doesn't instill confidence in in us as an organization and school districts in massachusetts To continue we know that things are going to change as we know more about the virus like no one thinks that You know what we good conversation day with a staff member about, you know The days when we were much more concerned about, you know Sharing of books and things like that and not that we don't want to be careful about it now But we're in a little different place. We know more than we did in september Everyone understands that but uh, the continually changing guidance and potentially putting this, you know system in place I mean if they didn't put a date, it's probably may, you know, we're looking at the high school Otherwise it would have put a date on uh to to have uh all this go into The last few weeks of the school year, um Is very difficult and it's going to put a really hard choice on families when we can't guarantee six feet Uh, and we've been saying six feet all year. So, you know, I think that that's a real challenge with it It's making, you know school committees like tonight, right? This is the first time we're having conversation of like, I guess we can't do six feet Right, I guess these are things that we talked about all year that we Can't do because there's a change, you know, this kind of imposed change Um, and I think Communities in general would have felt better about this level of directive if it was directed at next year Um, because we would had more time to plan And be more thoughtful about it. And I think this is, you know, yet another twist Uh in the road this year and one that we weren't anticipating at the high school level, which You know from what I've read in science and talking to our public health director, which is much more important than what I read You know, she has the greatest level of concern From a health perspective about high school students and particularly high school students at less than six feet of distancing Who are working with different cohorts throughout the school day She's not saying that high school students can't be in i'm not i'm not going to quote her for saying that That's not the conversation we had Uh, but in terms of concern, you know, as students get older, that's the concerns get more significant from a health perspective Um, so I think it's it's a real challenge for us. It's going to be a real challenge for staff Um, so I want to really acknowledge that they're hearing this You know information for the first time again. We got it this afternoon. You know, we did meet we actually uh during Cunningham Jennifer tees and I had a pre-existing meeting with members some members of the executive board of the apa and some members of the jlmc from the apa and So we we talked about this briefly today, but most of it was more about details about Going in and some some problem solving that was very helpful. Um, but I think, you know, it's Um superintendents my phone probably like a lot of other people's phones blew up this afternoon and it was a lot of it was my colleague saying, you know, you had another twist in turn and Another mandate and and the consequences are so high and that was, you know, a little bit of a surprise We knew some mandate was coming at elementary. I think that was really clear from last week Um, you know that we do have a lot of concerns about this And we don't feel like we have to what mrs. McDonald said we don't really feel like there's viable options On the other side of it given the stakes and given, you know, what's being claimed as illegal Um illegal document document that supersedes a lot of other documents so We're sort of caught in the middle of this and yet being asked to implement things At a timeline that was unexpected. Sorry. I'll I'll stop by venting in a little bit Or I'll stop now I can't promise that I won't get back to it when someone else asks a question and none of this is about Really about whether students should be in person or remote. I mean, I think our high school team was doing In my opinion a fabulous job dealing with some of the most complex set of variables to come up with models that we're going to work Effectively for our students And our faculty and I think that that's a little bit of loss and maybe a little bit of the edge in my comments is that That work really went away at the middle school We sent a survey out in the last 24 hours asking for a hybrid return With a an FAQ document that's describing what that program would look like and so Unfortunately, you know, I want to be really candid with with you all that it makes us me Look quite foolish to send a survey out and have Invalidated a couple hours later And families are taking this and they don't know when we're trying to figure out Should we send a retraction statement and we're trying to sort all this out in real time? So I think You know, if anything what we've learned this year is trying to build relationships And build confidence and moving forward is really important And you know at the elementary level, I won't speak to it directly But I think we had that plan and you know, we were working on that at secondary and I think Appropriate ways So, you know, I think your frustration that you share Kerry is going to be shared by a whole lot of people staff members And families because when families say we only want to send our kids back Some families may feel they only want to send our kids back if we can guarantee six feet And when we can't they're going to say well, why don't you do that? And when we say we can't it's going to be really unsatisfying Uh for many folks and you know, I think one thing that we talked about two today is that We're very concerned about the implications for students who choose remote You know, what is that experience going to look like? Is it going to be a Is it going to be a substantially different or lesser experience Instead of having a dedicated remote teacher to being sort of Google-meeted into a class and is that going to push teachers to be relying much more on slides And more interactive Presentation and more engaging work. So so we have a whole lot of concerns and frustrations. So sorry your question elicited them I was trying to hold off on it, but you uh, you open the floodgates on that one Kerry So I apologize for my soliloquy and I'll turn it back to you Yeah, I um Uh, I to share share the extreme frustration You know, it's it's Well, you know, it's it's helpful Sarcasm is uh noted in there to receive this kind of direction A year into the pandemic as opposed to when it might have been actually more supremely helpful um early on in um, whether the summer or even in the fall Um, particularly when it comes with it with the hammer of the of the consequences if we don't comply um So it was you know, extreme disappointment and um Frustration and the amount of work that everybody in the community and you know staff administrators teachers school committee members um That we've put in over over the year only to have all of it pulled out at the last minute and have very little time to put together Um a plan and I think you know to pull your word dr. Morris that confidence right um a lot of it um, you keep saying to um repeatedly To it takes time to do things well and not make mistakes in doing that and All of a sudden, you know, we're having to pivot and make a very dramatic change in our plans um, and that's not going to instill um, I mean, it's going to be difficult to instill the kind of confidence that um That we we would hope to have across the board and across the community. So it's um, So really disappointing. I think um Uh, I saw it a hand. Um, I saw mr. Deming that you had your hand up But I wanted to just double check that there were other if others wanted to make a comment or ask a question This can you I thought I saw your hand up as well Uh, it it was for a second. I think um, dr. Morris answered my question. Um, I was the information from desi supersedes all other agreements Previously made That's what they're claiming and they're multiple times This is a legal document and that it's a new regulation that has to be complied with So, um, yeah That that's that's the way they're they're framing it that they've checked with their legal counsel and this is A law of land that has to has to occur. So, um, you know, that that's going to be a real tension point for many people staff members and many people in the community um, and I just want to be Transparent about that, you know and and you know, again, you're getting a little rawness tonight so I apologize, you know, that's not directed at you all but it's um, I think it's a rawness that all of us, um in leadership roles are facing about what our role is and how do we How do we pivot yet again, uh as we were in the process of pivoting In a way that we felt, you know, pretty good about and pretty comfortable with not everybody But I think collectively we as leaders felt pretty good about what we were going to be able to provide for students and and get them in the building, um in ways that we felt more comfortable with so I think that that's sort of where we are, but that's in the desi document That's what's being claimed. It is a new regulation and needs to be complied with My only other question if that's all right was, um, the students who choose remote So I I apologize if it's in there. I didn't have a chance to read through the document before the meeting. Um So, I mean we had have a really strong remote teaching force. Um And and we know that there are some teachers Given whatever reasons are going to need to remain remote Are is it possible for us to keep that happening or we are Have to be having, you know Cameras propped up in classrooms and have instruction that way So I think oh sam, did you want to jump in? I'm sorry. Do you mind if I answer? I don't know if I can fully answer You know the faculty and staff at Amherst High have done An inordinate amount of work to make this and and the work they're doing is frankly spectacular I watch it daily and I'm really proud of the work And I do believe that this directive will compromise the integrity of what we've done so far I don't know how else to say it. I do think there are some options Um, and we can take a look at them, but I don't believe we've got the right technology To stream what's happening in class And to do that well and so We can use the the technology that we've essentially mastered To leverage this to the best of our ability, but I I do see A little a little bit of compromising of integrity frankly and it's it's heartbreaking. It's heartbreaking. It's very hard to to imagine it Being ideal and I'd love to be able to do that, but frankly we can't ask faculty to To to do both As well as you know, so I know that's not what you're asking. Oh, no, I'm just acknowledging not asking No, no, I most certainly was not asking for The same staff member to do their Regular awesome job in the classroom and also do an awesome job on teaching online. I was just saying that you know You know I'd say throughout the district, um, you know elementary Middle school high school the remote teaching has been really fantastic. Um You know, I I get to watch it in my house a lot of times, but um It we've just done a good job with their remote Yeah, I agree. Yes This is going to take some creativity Which I know faculty have but it it's um, it's really hard to pivot this quickly Um, given and and many people have planned out uh their courses Quite far and so to sort of stop in our tracks and um and also be thinking about things like ap exams and I just it's There's a there's a lot to think about and we're going to do our best. We'll see Yeah, if I could quote the document because I think it addresses Your question. So on page Six of the document, um, this is emboldened to the comment made earlier about the typeface for many districts This will be a substantial programming shift mid school year Families should expect that districts may need to make challenging trade-offs to accommodate the full in-person instructional model And then it goes on to to sort of talk about Some of those trade-offs And really the focus on the virtual is about accessing The instruction not about what we would say which is not an access wasn't our primary goal for distance learning Engagement was and and it really the language is used in the document. It's not a critique of the document I think they're being really I could critique I think I have but this is them being really blunt about saying The goal is an engagement if you choose virtual. It's about accessing Um, so when they talk about trade-offs, they're honestly talking about trade-offs And you know one thing I can compliment is at least, you know, whether I agree with that opinion or not I think they're not pulling punches about what their intent is That that they're saying remote is about access Um, and in person is much more about the engagement piece and and for many families who can't send their kids back That's a really hard message. Uh, and I think sam did a really mature way of saying it I'll be slightly less mature Then sam was um that this is and we heard that feedback in the elementary, you know It's not an elementary issue But one of the things that on an elementary town hall last night that we heard from parents is a concern That the remote was going to be less focused with less resources And last night I felt really comfortable pushing back against that opinion I'm not saying person agreed with me, but I felt really comfortable saying no No, we're dedicating remote teachers in the same way we have with this guidance I'm not sure I can confidently respond in the same way um that I did 24 hours ago 25 hours ago, so Just want to share that quote from their document Thank you Just to clarify your confidence in Providing that at the secondary level Yeah, I wouldn't speak to the Ellen I just use that as an example of something I said explicitly that wasn't it was at an elementary town hall I would have said the same thing last night if it was a secondary town hall if we're doing one of the middle school or high school or summit And and given this guidance That doesn't seem to be the the focus of the guidance And I'm not sure I can make that same commitment to today that I made last night um I want to come back to you before I see your hand mr. Demling um the Your comment earlier about the timing for this and I just want to um I I know you know the desire is to keep moving quickly, but I also want to sort of just ask the question while we have our high school administration colleagues here About the time that you need to prepare something for a thoughtful discussion about what that might look like So yes, we have a sense of urgency of hearing that but at the same time Don't want to sort of ask Ask you well to come back to us if you if you don't won't have the time to prepare Thoughtfully for that so I just want to sort of put that out there You don't have to answer that right now. Um, we'll talk about agenda planning at the end of the meeting, but mr. Demling yeah, so, um I think it's probably already been mentioned, but it could probably be mentioned again a couple times so um Parents who want to keep their students remote are going to be able to this this guidance does not change that There's no edict from the state that you have to go back Um, so that that's one I think parents should should feel comfortable about second second is we haven't This is a regional meeting. I know you just use an example from elementary And it's kind of weaving into this whole six foot discussion and so I'm I'm not asking you for an opinion on the impact of this guidance Um on our elementary because this isn't an elementary meeting But I just want to clarify no one has made any comment that the six foot Commitment uh is going to be an issue for elementary. Uh, I presume we'll discuss that next week um And then just in general, you know about the six feet and and the impact of this and the uncomfortableness I mean I'm as frustrated and uncomfortable as anybody that the heavy hand of the state and For all the reasons mentioned about the timing of this and Uh, and all that. Um, you know on the other hand, I do want to be transparent, um In and honest, you know with the public that um, you know the way I approach safety and my commitment To safety and why I support certain elements of safety is is is a commitment to be What I think of is just ruthlessly empirical Which is we we need to evaluate the data in front of us and we need to keep evaluating it and as that changes We need to allow it to continue to change and You know, I still feel personally committed to to six foot distance as as the metric as the um the standard and that's what we you know signed up for this year You know, I do want to acknowledge that this the science has evolved and then it's it's not all just We don't we don't hang our entire safety hat on 72 inches between people You know, we have very consciously invested a lot of time and effort and money into layered mitigation strategies Not that we leads to which is masks Not the least of which is is the air exchange and the ventilation that you know from our tireless facilities department You know, we've kept up Excellent quality and and there is different research now that shows what coveted spread Is when you go below the six foot distance and you know, I don't want to go point counterpoint all over the internet But but there is a lot of data out there now. Um, and so I feel like You know to I feel like pot of transparency with the safety discussion when we talk about Implementing a plan that um, it looks like we will be legally required to Um, and and depending on the yield, right? This is another big thing that we which is my urgency for moving the process forward until we survey parents You know who's coming back and in which classes we don't know what the distancing Requirement is going to be um because we don't know the students number of students are going to be wanting to come back I just I just feel like we need to be you know um Encourage encourage that that kind of ruthless empiricism of of you know evaluating What is the day to say about coveted transmission in Massachusetts schools when The distance has been less than six feet and and how do we you know, is is that um You know, how do we feel about that safety and then what do we do? What are we doing this year? And then what are we doing next year? You know, I don't have any easy Wrapped with a bow conclusion for that thought. Um, but I did want to you know, given the This guidance really forces that on discussion to the fore. Um, I just wanted to to to call it out as something um, I'm thinking about Are there any other um comments or questions? I'm not seeing any um raised hand so Our um our next regional meeting is in two weeks Um, and I'm just want to sort of double check. We're not at the agenda planning, but I would I think while we have um The principal sadeek and um assistant principals here that it would be in um, slow, then principal sloven as well. It would be helpful for us to at least get the input in terms of sort of what what um, you all see as next steps and in Timing for you Yeah, so um, if I could start just to say that um, one of the things that we have to do which we haven't done in the last Five hours, um is also to connect the middle school to high school and summon academy That you know, we're talking about shared routes Um, one of my other concerns that I didn't express earlier is the transportation guidance we have um, you know, even desi's transportation guidance didn't change at the secondary level and Our capacity if everyone wants to come back and needs transportation to get everyone here is is Limited is the nicest term I could use so I think you know some of the work that this team These teams have to do is about the teaching and learning. There's a tremendous amount of logistics Planning that has to go in as well from our operations side. So sorry, I didn't mean to Step on your toes principal sadeek, but um, I know you were about to jump in But I just I think it's important to note that the teaching learning is all good and well and if we're not connecting with our facilities um And that team then uh, we're probably not going to do a good job of this So it's a more complex operation than the people just on this call But I'm sorry principal sadeek. Won't you you were I think going to jump in Sorry dr. Morris So we definitely want to involve our faculty and staff in this process as much as possible So that process is going to start tomorrow and our faculty meeting will be dedicating It's about the whole meeting to Start into plan this and then we'll take some of the feedback and we'll get the smaller groups and continue the work we Understand the urgency of it So if you schedule Us back for a week. I mean it would be an update I'm not exactly how far we're gonna get but we're gonna be working hard on it. There's no question Again, as dr. Morris also said, there's a lot of parts a lot of people we gotta collaborate with So we'll definitely keep you updated though Yeah, and my two cents on that is if we could space out and I know we'll talk about this agenda planning But I'll say this while the high school team's here if we could space it out a little more in a week, um, I think what will what the high school team be able to come up with is going to be More formed and have less conversations like tonight tonight needed to wait need to go the way it needed to go Just based on the nature of things But I think the more we can have conversations where the high school has enough space and time to come up with more clear thoughts and plans and Objectives what I can do in the interim is certainly share with the committee if there's surveys They go out to make sure that the committee is informed But but I am a little concerned that if we continue to come back to the committee before things are formed It it may not have the most May not be the most productive discussions For both the committee but also for the high school team If there was a way to put them High school folks and give them time like school wasn't happening for instance, which it is for two weeks in In a room and come up with something as they get a feedback that'd be great But the reality is they're doing this on top of the the normal day job that they have Which is Significant job. So, you know, I guess my my plea would be if you give us a little more space Particularly this team a little more space to come up with something a little more Cohesive that that might be better, you know, and I can definitely do the interim updates either electronically or at a future meeting next week, but I just I feel like if we these are public meetings and I I'm low then you all know this to put administrators or leaders in positions where they're presenting things that are Not yet formed. Um, so it's always a tricky balance that way, but um, I actually wonder if before we move on if we were going to move on if Miss grip co-head any thoughts again? I do this to her all the time and so I owe her sometime in the future and Fake goods or something. Uh, but you know as a high school student not rap I just I certainly value your opinion if you had any questions for us or comments, you know, uh, You know, just wonder if I could prompt you and passing is always of of course Fine, but we really appreciate all the time you spend on this committee and and want to make sure you're invited to participate if you'd like to Yeah, thanks. Um, I think I guess from a student perspective what I've been hearing is like Well, I don't think a lot of people have heard about the guidance that came out today obviously because it came out today Um, but I think that with the sort of old plans Even then the majority of students have been Like a little iffy about going back And obviously that's not like official. So but I don't know if that helps at all, but that's sort of what I've been hearing That's that is helpful. Do you have any questions of either, you know, the high school team myself? That would be helpful to, you know, know if you're going to be chatting with students tomorrow morning Um, I guess just Uh, well, someone's asked this before but like it is like optional like students will still be able to Like stay home if that's What they want, okay, that's all Sure, and there's a commitment for the end of this year. I think next year There's a there's a part of the document that leaves it big but one might Like It's sort of implied that they're not sure that, you know Working or being a student remotely might extend into the next school year But there is a commitment for that to happen for the rest of the current school year I'm sorry. Ms. McDonough. I didn't mean to cut you off at all. I just felt like um This group could not to to jump in if she had anything she wanted to ask or share Thank you any other Ops questions That's where we move on So, uh, thank you everybody for joining us tonight and sharing that even these Immediate reactions to this direction and look forward to hearing more from you as you as you get more solid plans Thank you Thanks. Thanks everybody So next up we have pooled testing And that's testing for COVID-19 Yeah, and dr. Brady's with us tonight and she's gonna do most of the presenting Robin supernat our interim nurse manager had another commitment tonight So she's not able to be here and I'll key this up as well By the way, I have a lot of uh There's a lot of wonderful things going on I realized I didn't do my superintendent update didn't necessarily harp on them As much as perhaps it should but there's a number of topics tonight that and I Perhaps having some level of Frustration or negative thoughts about and and unfortunately pool testing is going to be one of them And I'll let dr. Brady Talk because there is some benefits and there are some prospects and potential I would say we've had a rocky time in terms of rolling out and some of that had to do with You know the vendor that we're using and how they're communicating and and that hasn't gone smoothly But some of it's to do with the prospect of pool testing Which hasn't necessarily met the reality of many districts I will say that desi is very in their document today than half the districts are involved in pool testing I will tell you that there are many districts particularly in the western part of the state that are You know I was in meeting the other day on this that are really stepping away from pool testing They're feeling it's not It's not necessarily achieving the ends that it had in mind It's also a huge financial commitment. The desi is only covering it as you'll find out for another month or so In terms of the costs of it. So You know, I think dr. Brady did a really balanced job of sharing some of the what is pool testing? What are some of the benefits and what are some of the challenges that we're experiencing? She's more balanced than I am today. So that's it's a good thing. She's presenting on this But you know, uh, you know, it is something that we are actively pursuing and involved with but I would not This is not a presentation that's going to be a ringing endorsement of pool testing and You know, I just want to be clear. I think as opposed to the block schedule where you know, I could Absolutely endorse the high school leadership teams work on that as something that we believe is in the best interest of kids For the next school year. This is not that type of presentation. So I think I just want to be clear at the beginning because I think you're often used to seeing me Introduce people or make presentations of things we we are fully believing in at the moment We're presenting them until data proves us different and at this point Data is making us really question some of the benefits of pool testing. So with that dour introduction I'll bring dr. Brady our student services director of student services On to talk a bit about what pool testing is. What are potential benefits? What are potential challenges we're seeing and how are we thinking about this moving forward? So thank you for being here dr. Brady So thank you and thank you for that introduction because it saves me a lot of explanation Mike you'll be able to pull up the slides so and I I do want to say that I'm happy to do this presentation and I am not a medical person, although I would say as Beginning to learn more and more about pool testing. I've certainly got an education That I didn't anticipate having so I've liked and enjoyed working alongside robin super not and Mary o'brien and the other nurses in our district To learn about this. So I'm happy to answer questions If they get too medical in nature, we will have to defer them because I can only share the little bit that I've learned so far. So Back several months ago when desi shared the option of districts joining for pool testing. I think What I just want to share is that we as a district really saw that as an opportunity to at least Trial this and see if this was going to be something that would really add Value to the health and safety measures that the district has been doing so We signed on and we figured we would be learning a lot and we have learned a lot and so as we go through the slides I'll give you a little bit of information about What pool of testing is? Why we're embarking upon it and as well as Dr. Morris just said to talk about what are some of the challenges and what we've learned to date. So The first slide is just about why and this is really as a way to To be one piece of a comprehensive strategy to really um Mitigate some of the concerns around COVID transmission. So that we already had the Symptomatic by next now we had already signed up for that And this was a way to kind of add one more piece to that puzzle of how could we know If somebody with the virus was in the school and Address it quickly so there wouldn't be a spread So that was the why that that desi told us and we thought that absolutely that made sense to do So i'm not going to read this whole slide but just To give you some information about what it means to be pool tested This is um a swab a nasal swab that is done either by the individual themselves or by a nursing staff and um depending upon if you're testing students or staff those Swabs are put in a pool if you're doing staff. I think What I want to say is that oh that just changed. I don't know if we can if people can still see that but um The pool testing for staff is no more than five staff in a pool And that becomes important later when we talk about the cost of this So those swabs are put in a pool. They're set to the laboratory Where they do a pcr test of the pool not on the individuals and we as a district get back a Report on that pool with 24 to 48 hours later to say if the pool was positive or if the pool was negative And If the pool is positive we'll talk about that on an upcoming slide Then there's further steps you have to take if the pool comes back negative The presumption is that everybody in that pool Is negative and instruction and learning goes on as it had been going on so The the dilemma comes in and the next steps come in if the pool is positive So mike if you can go to the next slide so This just kind of shows the flow of what happens We right now are doing our pool testing on thursdays So it means on thursdays the a pool is taken It gets sent to the lab and then sometime over the weekend Because it goes 24 seven and the result would be Put on to our portal So if the pool is positive becomes the the concern because that gives you an idea that somebody in that pool Has a virus load enough that the test had come back positive. So if you mike can go to the next slide um, so If the pool is positive the next step we go to is our by next now antigen test, which we have been using for symptomatic people already You you test everybody in the pool with by next if Somebody if then you find out that there's the positive So when somebody comes back as a positive by next you're then able to identify Who that person is and all that person would need to follow the the protocols about quarantining and any close contacts with that person um But everybody else who was in that pool That was tested that their by next did not come back positive came back negative. They can go back to instruction What is possible to happen? We have not had this but um We're we're Waiting our turn to have this happen if The by next antigen test, which is not as sensitive as the pcr test If the by next test does not come up with a positive individual Then all the people in that pool need to be referred to their primary care provider For a pcr test because at that point you don't know who might be positive so In the last part of this slide says that that means that we could potentially Really have three different tests that needed to be done until we were able to isolate and say where was that positive? um individual so That would be your pool testing your by next and then the pcr And during that time all those people are quarantining because you don't have a result at that point um That's part of the reason why desi and the protocol says only five staff members Can be in a pool because if you can imagine Going through those steps and if you had a pool of 10 to 20 Staff members it would really impact how the school go on after that Okay, so um, this just kind of summarizes the district responsibilities It's managing all the logistics and I will tell you that um This is a new roll out and there's a lot of different vendors And I think the vendors are learning at the same time that they're having us go through this process. So it has been um a really time intensive um undertaking at this point um learning the their Software systems then getting their software systems up to date the data entry um, we have not done White spread pool testing yet So we haven't had that many staff Involved in going around the schools having to swab everybody But that will when we're doing that that will take away from nurses being able to do all the rest of their nursing job. So They have to do all that. Um We've been already working on consents. I will say Just candidly Our vendor and the people that work in that company are lovely and we started with Being told these are the paper consents send them out We did all that and then they got their online portal up and running So now we had to go back to everybody and say sorry now. Can you please go to the online portal and do your consent? So it's been a rough kind of beginning And as we talk a little bit later if it's just a rough beginning, but it has value added I think then we could talk about Is this something that we really want to continue with so um, next slide please mike These are some of the challenges so and I know this is not a decision making presentation that you're going to vote on this But I do we did want to be able to share with you Where we are in this process and what our thoughts to date are at this point. So, um, one of the things and We've had some conversations with desi and the dph as well as our vendor for this is about the participation rate So right now for the paper consents we sent out We've gotten about 50 percent of those people have said yes to participating in pool testing And so the question that we're asking ourselves and we've asked Them to really give us their thoughts on this is with only 50 percent participating Is that Really lend to value added for this whole process because there's that other 50 percent of the people who aren't participating so you're really not having the 5 percent of people in the pool to be able to guide your next steps and to really mitigate The virus and the spread of the virus So that's a question that we're asking ourselves really seriously one of the things that has been said to date is that sometimes you get a low participant participation rate to begin with And perhaps you'll get a higher participation rate A few weeks in we have yet to see that so we can't really speak to that at this point Um, I think I talked a little bit about it before Can I jump in? So I think just I want to note that there was a number of other superintendents who are concerned about whether this is the best time of Best use of resources. I'm not just money, but other resources Time being probably the most significant one and and this is consistent What we're hearing from other districts in western massachusetts Some who goes not to participate as well as some who are in the same boat as we are who are Having second thoughts about it. Um, and and the numbers get lower When districts who have had students in when they include students in the testing The the the resources obviously is higher in terms of time And financial resources, but the numbers are really pretty low And when and there's a whole bunch of reasons for that But when the numbers tend to be really low The kind of concept and the objective that they put on the first slide about why we would be potentially doing it The the value really isn't as There when we have low participation and that's that's what many many districts in the east in the western part of the state Are seeing I don't know as much in the eastern part of the state um You know, so there are a lot of questions Including from people involved in health agencies and you see some of our partner districts that you would usually think That we would be aligned with they've they've opted not to participate because of This very factor they surveyed staff and students and founded even before they started that the numbers were really low We didn't have many people in so, you know, it was easy for us to jump in But I just wanted to note that that's not an Amherst regional public schools unique challenge. It does seem like Most of the the superintendents who I speak with are having that very same challenge as well Despite encouragement and all those types of things Sorry, I just I just I don't want to make it that it's about this particular district. It's really a broader phenomenon Yeah, no that that's really helpful To to share. Um, it certainly is our experience and and mike has contact with more districts, so We have um, I had a lot of questions today. So and and I might say my Kind of participation in this as I said in the beginning. I am not a medical person And if robin was here tonight or or mary or any of our nurses I think they I did check with them today to say, you know Is this just my perspective or or how do you feel about this and they are although Everybody they were really a hundred percent in to sign up for this What we're seeing for where we are at this point They have serious concerns about whether or not this really has The value added that we were hoping it would have Um, the time intensive part is not to be minimized and right now the time intensive Part has really been for the setup However, we are we the number of people that have signed up are very small So even if we get more fluency with the prop with this, you know What we've learned with the setup the amount of people that it will the people will be having to Do the the testing for will increase and so the time intensive part, I think will just increase substantially As well as the packaging and and putting things together when they send us shipping labels They send us boxes, but all of this the the manpower to put that together comes from our personnel Yeah, I'll say if I could just add I mean, I want to thank, you know robin and mary or brian who's been leading this This has really been someone's full-time job Since we started and we have we're small scale right now, right? We don't know that many kids and we don't have many staff in This is relevant more to staff than students at this point So, you know when we think about 80 pools when you get down to, you know fade time thinking about that You know it may involve not just I don't think we can do that without maintain our current staffing without pulling nurses Away from being able to see kids during the school day Just want to be really, you know clear about the the resource part of it's not just about the Financial costs. It's about, you know, what do we want our nurses doing during the school day? Sorry, thank you bun bun again. My apologies. No, absolutely and it is. I mean, it's one thing to test You know 20 people it's another thing to test 400 people so once you get to that amount of people and and I think what we heard when when we This has been presented to us by desi and the dph and the the vendors is that many districts Contract out and and have are hiring additional people whether they're Hiring and just increasing their nursing personnel or they're asking for other people to come in because there's just no way that somebody can do their full-time job and and this responsibility on so You know, I can if we knew it was going to take this long I think rob and mary and I would have added up the amount of hours that we have spent already But I think we presumed it was going to be not quite as Time-consuming as it has turned out to be and then there's the budgetary implications which are not small And you know, certainly Other people have more oversight in that and you know, I think we as a district from my perspective I will say has spent a great deal of money To date for this year to increase the health and safety and that's been really value added Will this additional cost have value added? I think is the real question that I'm asking myself So I just kind of gave an example because the cost to test each pool Which right now this is funded by desi through april 18th So right now other than the the personnel cost in terms of time. There is no additional financial Cost for us, but each pool is $50 So if we thought about testing that 400 people number that I just chose and That could be no more than 80 pools We would be talking about a cost about $4,000 a week So if I take us from april 18th when desi's funding ends And I take us to the end of the school year. That's between 33 and $34,000. So It's a lot of money And again, if it's value added certainly I think we're fortunate that we have a community that puts resources in a place where It makes a difference for The learning and the health and safety of our staff and our students I think this is a question. We're really asking ourselves as to And that's for eight weeks. Never mind as we look into going into next year Um, and when we began to have these concerns, we also kind of sat back and reflected a little bit and our nurses who are very active um working with the department of Health and they're they're active in the vaccine clinics. One of the questions that they said is Our do we in our community really need to have this done in our schools? Because you mass has an asymptomatic testing site Many places don't have that. We're fortunate here in amherst that if people just Have no symptoms, but for one reason or another feel like it's important for them to be tested They can go to you mass. I think it's three days a week And have an asymptomatic test. So in some ways for people who are interested in Wanting to just kind of monitor their their health and their covid status that already exists for them So that left us with the question Is this a duplication and given kind of what the cost benefit analysis is Is that a place? Is that a direction we want to go? So that's just kind of some of the challenges. Um What we're doing right now is we're rolling this out with staff um, we We had a bit of a slower start than we thought because of the consent forms and having to change from paper online So we had our first pool tested last week happily. I can tell you it came back negative So we didn't have to go to the other part of the flow chart as to what happened if it came back positive I'd like to not not have to go to that But we will increase our amount of people that were testing in the coming weeks During this period of time where we're not incurring any additional cost and we will be working um You know with our leadership team and with our nurses to really assess um Is this a direction we want to continue to proceed or can we really mitigate our health and safety? um Concerns with all of our other measures without having to increase this so That that gives you an overview with some candid um Input from both dr. Morris and myself and I might say if robin super not our Interim nurse manager was here. She would tell you the same things as well Any question? Yeah, um before we go to questions just to clarify. We're not looking for a decision tonight on anything The testing continues. Um as funded by desi through the 18th Yeah, and our Our desire was to just bring this to you to share it with you for information And we will update you as well. Dr. Morris will update you as we go along Okay Um Well, thank you. That was um, that was comprehensive. So um despite your um your caveats at the beginning of your presentation I think it was it's very well done. So thank you for um doing that Um On behalf of the team that's been working on that any questions from the committee you covered it so thoroughly that there's no questions Mr. Demily I'm the spitzer head ahead of person Oh, okay, miss spitzer. Okay I think we're both trying to give folks another Opportunity to speak before either one of us let off the conversation So apologies for being so verbose this evening. Um, so I just want to say thanks to everybody for um working so hard on this Because it sounds like it's been a tremendous um effort. Um, and I want to acknowledge that and then I just want to clarify. So are we um I think there are a lot of reasons why we wouldn't anticipate using this in the next year. Hopefully all of All of once once folks are vaccinated like that and I know students won't be so I feel like there's the conversation about the teachers And then there's a conversation about the students. So I'm hoping that the teacher testing I know teachers aren't mandated all of that but hopefully enough of them will Be interested in that it'll be become a lot less important to be doing pool testing of teachers And we I know we haven't had students in the building So is the five person rule is that also for the students? And then I guess the other question is could you just remind us? I know this this is happening exclusively right now at at the distance learning centers and um And so are we but as we I mean we we essentially won't have any time in the region with students and And I know there are students in our buildings, but like with the return that we were just talking about We won't have any time with those folks from the middle or the high school Who are not in one of the specific programs? We have operating now in the buildings as an opportunity to kind of have a test of how it is um after You know after we've had a more traditional return to school And then I I guess I'm just going to close it. I think with all of this it's kind of I'm not the first person to use this analogy, but it's the swiss cheese model And so it feels like that that you know, I was excited about the testing because it just felt like One more piece of swiss cheese to put on top and obviously pool testing isn't going to solve the issue of you know, if you came in that on friday with With uh high enough virus load to get you know A positive test result, but you know on thursday, you know, we're still in the same situation On monday when somebody comes in and starts spreading the virus. I'm not saying that But the only thing I want to point out is that um It's felt to me like there was a lot of interest in the community and a lot of interest from teachers potentially So I was really surprised to see that 50 percent um interest in consenting and I'm just curious like Do you have any qualitative data on why people were not interested in doing it because I'm I'm really happy with that asymptomatic testing in town, but it is it only for people 10 and up And I know this is a regional meeting so I'm not going to say anything more than that, but um You know, it's it's not and not everybody has the time so it's from 7 to like 5 p.m And I could see that being a real challenge for our teachers who are interested in the testing And one of the conveniences is that like we could do it In the building while they're working and not require them to to make an appointment and show up someplace else So it sounds I'm not saying we should do it or not But these are just the things that um, I was thinking while you were speaking Well, I'll just do the last one first uh about staff and I think it's the same thing I've heard here as other districts is the idea of a pool test Means that you're going to get you potentially would get a positive result And not be sick and then have to go through those next steps And so that's a real Concern that we've heard I've heard directly from some staff here, but I've also heard superintendents talk about That's one thing if you yourself get tested and you know if the positive result if you get a positive result and You know, you're scared for the right reason so to speak It's a really different thing to get tested with a group Get another test, you know get a result and then potentially have to get two more tests To figure out what that is Um, so I think there is some feeling and I'm not there's no critique of this I think it's just human nature that people's comfort level is getting tested themselves is much higher than people's Tested getting tested in a group and then potentially getting information That doesn't directly relate to them, but then Causes a bunch of other steps to happen and that that sort of collective piece Um from a health perspective is really uncomfortable Or a number of other people and the implications are really uncomfortable for a number of other people as opposed to people I mean, I'll be blunt. There's one staff member who gets routinely tested on their own at UMass every week Um and said, you know at first when they heard about this, they're like, oh, no This makes sense like this would be better and they thought about it like it's not better Right, you know, my office is you know, we're where where this person works is three miles away from UMass Um that can work really effectively and then they're not Involving anyone else and also I heard from someone if I'm the one who tests positive I feel I would feel awful that there's been four or more, you know, other people Who have been waiting for a couple days and you know called their families and had all the implications So I think that the nature of the pooling Is one level removed from some people's comfort level Uh about receiving personal health information even though, you know What I could make the alternate argument about it. I actually can really identify or understand where people are coming from We're not used to help, you know pooling our health information. Right. It's not It's not what we're custom not it's not what's customarily done. We go the other way with our health information It's super private employers can't even ask about things, right? It's it's that and this is really pushing against that And I hadn't thought about it until I heard it from some staff members and other superintendents Are really hearing the same thing and that's not something that I feel comfortable trying to convince somebody of Like that's a personal choice about someone's personal health information And you know, one of the questions I got is why don't you push more people to be involved and That that's beyond my comfort level. I think this has to be a personal health decision that people make So, you know, I just want to balance it that I don't think being staff members who are not interested in pool testing are not interested in testing You know, what I'm hearing much more is it's not into the pooled part and also the number of steps that it might involve Bidex tests and then depending on that it might involve getting a PCR test And that might be multiple days away to get those results and the implications It doesn't feel immediate enough in terms of resolving some of Can getting results and moving forward, but that privacy piece is really important to people And the nature of pooling goes the other way on privacy, right? Because even if one person's positive in a group of five The other four person, right, you're gonna know who's not there, right? It just even though that might be the outcome anyway It feels really opening people up They feel very opened up in a way that they wouldn't with you know, individualized Confidential testing. I think the other thing that we can't get around is that we are the employer Right and for some people that's another barrier that you know, if you go to UMass and you get your results There's one level of removal from the person test doing the testing and your employer and that's even though if they test positive You know, people would let us know and we'd go through that There's a level of privacy of not not taking place at your workplace I go somewhere to get tested and that place is not the nurse's office at my employment Right and so, you know, I think these things are very real to individuals in our organization And you know, I think for folks who are saying, you know, just tell them they should I that's beyond that's beyond where I am that's that's, you know, that gets into Personal morality and ethics and pieces that, you know, I feel like as employers we have to be really delicate about You know, we can say it's a good idea But you know, I am not interested in convincing anyone to join a pool testing program that that has real deep-seated Uh, philosophical opinions that oppose that sorry if I you may want to answer miss spitzer's other questions But I actually find it really interesting That's why I get excited by your question because it was it was not the response I was expecting and that's what other superintendents and colleagues are finding In their districts as well is that people get a little insular with their health information and the more I've thought about it The more I can understand concerns about who's doing the testing. It's an employer. It's a colleague, frankly I mean, it's a nurse that they know Doing that testing and then sharing that results and for someone like me that might be comforting for other people It certainly doesn't feel that way Dr. Brady And I think those are really good points. I think one of the things that Kind of along those lines and then I'll go back to the questions we asked at the beginning um, miss spitzer, but um, I think many people who Say yes to begin with um, are signing on because people are just wanting to do anything and everything they can right now to ensure their Safety and the safety of those people around them. So I think people are signing on With not giving things too much thought like oh my gosh. This is something I can do I'm in I'm there to do it. So as much as we hear that oh The consent rate might be low right now, but it might increase I also think it could go the opposite way that once people realize that once a week They have to do a nasal swab and put it in this pool and kind of wait for results when they're feeling fine um That may not be something they want to do in the middle of their work day And as as dr. Mars was saying kind of that be part of Their work experience But we also have to remember we still have the by next now So if somebody is not feeling well, you know, they they get up in the morning Maybe they're just feeling like they're just a little extra tired We're going to have the time change next week They're just a little sluggish because of time change and by 11 o'clock in the morning They say gee, I'm really still not feeling well They have the option at that point to go right to the school nurse and have the by next test So that we don't lose that But back to your original I think question I might have lost some of them So you might have to repeat them you asked where we're doing it right now. So The places where we got consents to begin with were both at the high school in the distance learning center But we didn't stop at the distance learning center because we have the office personnel there We asked them if they wanted to Participate we asked our athletic coaches if they wanted to participate people that we knew at the high school who were having Direct contact with students or with each other on a routine basis and we also Offered that in crocker farm as well because in crocker farm. We have preschool and our early Primary grades are in person as well. So They've all they've done their paper consents those who wanted to but Now they'll do their online consents and we'll be able to start so we We have the list of people who are scheduled to be in person at wildwood um And kind of we made a decision before since that's not for another couple weeks To see how these first few weeks went with crocker farm in the high school Did I get all your questions or did I miss something? I I think I was also just clarifying that students aren't currently getting tested. That's correct. We start We wanted to start with staff. Um I think before when we were first signing up for this I think we were unclear it was like oh this makes sense to do As we began to learn and kind of see how complex some of the Beginning steps were we said, oh, let's just start this right now with staff Let's kind of begin to see how this goes and if we're then Think that it's something we will proceed with then we could offer this consents to families But the by next is still Offered and in place for students at this point So I've been I see one one more hand We're well past our our agenda time on this. So, um, hopefully the question is is quick. Um, and then I'll ask I'm sure that um Folks would be able willing to answer questions offline if there's further questions. So mr. Demily Yeah, uh, real quick comment on question because I know we have this little budget thing afterwards. Um, yeah I mean not to pile on but you know another concern I've had about this is the by next test accuracy. So for the latest cdc Study on this is that it's only 36 percent accurate for asymptomatic Cases so you could have a case where you have five people in a pool It goes out the pcr tests positive. It comes back if that if the person who's who caused it Is asymptomatic Then you're more than likely going to miss them in the in the by next testing Which means you've now kicked five people into quarantine And we then have to wait for the pcr test and so that has a pretty disruptive impact on the educational experience to say nothing of all the other Uh issues that you've mentioned with it, but um, that's that's just the other layer does I would just concur and agree with what you're saying. Those are concerns we have as well Okay Thank you. And and thanks for um sharing that information with us tonight Thanks, dr. Brady um, if folks are okay, um Uh, like taking a quick, uh, two minute. Uh, let's say three three minute break. Um, I want to keep us moving but um Recognize that we've been here at it for two hours. So um, we'll take a quick Break if folks Yeah, okay be back here and by 840 no later than that Okay, um, so now we're moving on to our um second budget hearing for the fy 22 budget Um, and just uh for folks watching Um, we we had a budget hearing previously But we didn't have sort of the full information and the full detail on ads and cuts and so wanted to give the public the opportunity to And see all of that detail and um and share their Comments with us. We do have um one comment For our budget hearing. So how we'll do this. I'll share the the um input that we have For the from the public on that then turn it over to dr. Slaughter and dr. Morris to um go through those details and updates since the last time we reviewed the budget And then we'll open it up for questions and comments Discussion from the committee are folks seeing this comment and that um That comment is included in the public comment document and the same one that um The same document that we looked at earlier in the meeting for public comment Which is or will be available on the regional school committee agenda speech Um, so now I will turn it back over to dr. Slaughter and dr. Morris To share with us the update on the budget Yeah, and I'm going to cue that. I think miss mcdonald said it. Well, it's an update We're not going to go through all the budget documents again. Um Really, uh, some some things have shifted And the two shifts we're going to notice is our budget got a little bit better So we able to restore some of the uh reduction that we had talked about Last time and we want to actually share some of the updates as it relates to Assessments to member towns and assessment methods So that's really we're not going to go through much more than that unless there's questions, but really looking at the ads cuts page Talking about as the budget got a little bit better mostly due to health insurance aspects What we were able to propose to bring back that was on the cuts list and and then to talk about assessment methods and and perhaps a plan to move forward with them and A request from one of our member towns About next steps on that as well. So, um, you know, dr. Slaughter I don't think it's worth going over all the slides, you know, because it's been really just the minor changes I wonder if you were able to bring up the as in cuts document For that slide that page in the slides rather Yes, I'll do that okay, so, um Kelly zoom on this a little bit more or is this uh Feels okay to me. I don't know if other people how other people are seeing it Maybe A little bit I think would be helpful. That's good. That's perfect So the text at the top is probably not essential. You know what this is. It's an as in cuts list Um, so I'll just I'll give you a few visual cues here So one of the things in much in the same keeping with what we did last year with the changes that we had I've I've tried to highlight those in yellow Uh at the left hand edge of of the document just to point out those things that have changed from when we last spoke to today um One thing I'll point out is that uh Uh Sort of working my way up from the bottom things that have aligned through them are things that were on the list that we've taken off the list Uh other things that are yellow are either new or modified. So for example, uh in the sort of middle of the page There where it's this high school. It's this core academic fd e reductions Uh, that number is different the 1.6 and the total dollars is a little different than uh, what we had originally Shown you a couple weeks ago. So it's a little quite frankly a little better than it was It's it's a smaller fd change and and a smaller dollar amount um And part of that's just a refinement of of information as we've gone through and and gotten closer to to your approval in the budget We just know no things better than we did Uh, the the bigger dollar change is is near the top of the page, which is Under the risk and benefits character category. Um, you see a three hundred and fifteen thousand dollar Uh reduction and that's a reduction in a cost that we have um And the 15 000 is really I sort of pulled that from the top line where it says turnover savings because the turnover savings included both salaries and benefits and so I merged that in with this because this is a benefit Uh, uh savings for us. So I put those two together But you know the three hundred thousand dollars part of that is because in the coming year we will have a health insurance premium holiday and what that really means is that we just don't pay for insurance one month and the the Uh cost of that for both employees as well as the district goes away for that month Our insurance stays in effect and and what happens is at the insurance company they Their bank account is a little too large is basically a simple way to describe it And so they use that reserve of money that they have that's larger than they want to carry Uh to sort of cover costs for that month But that results in the district having a cost savings about a one-time cost savings of about three hundred thousand dollars And so we're leveraging that and so it makes our total at the bottom of the page a larger number um But that helps uh, uh helps us essentially restore those those things that are lined through Uh at the bottom of the page and so that's really a a positive bit of news from the standpoint of of where we stand From a from an ads and cuts perspective And so I think I'll pause right here for a moment and let people sort of stare at this a bit And and think about it a bit and then uh, ask any questions they might have and then we'll we'll switch over to assessment that's in my list If folks have any questions on this Mr. Gemling Yeah, so um, it's it's good to see less cuts than the last time. Um, it's still pretty painful to see this list of cuts um I appreciate the creativity of trying to keep it as far away from the classroom as possible, but um, you know, I I think it's important to remind ourselves in the public that Well, you know, when we cut things like the like the high school dean and family center outreach These might not be people who are teach sitting in a classroom teaching students at desks, but are Encouragedly vital to the level support that we provide. So it's it's still pretty difficult to see them on here um So dr. Morrison, I wonder if you could just talk a little bit a bit about why not restore the family center outreach position I'm not saying that you don't support the position. Otherwise it wouldn't be there. Um to begin with um, but you know in this Brutal zero sum game of budgeting, you know when we're restoring some things and not other things and trying to keep b&d and all that Um, let's talk about those pros and cons a little bit. Yeah, so that's it's a really hard one You know, we did a lot of soul searching on this question that particular outreach position really been morphed over time to do more Student leadership than more direct. These aren't what it's not one of our outreach workers Who's more directly connected within the community? It's uh, it was a staff member. It's a vacant position this year and it's someone who did tremendous work around student leadership within the school Since we were able to maintain or both of our restorative practices positions are climbing Positions at the middle school and high school There was some duplication in some of the work that they're both Both the positions in the family center as well as the middle school high school positions We're both doing work around student leadership as well as many other people They're not they didn't corner the market on it, but we do feel like Uh, while we would not like to cut this position it is a position that we can look at roles and responsibilities And try to see if a building-based person could fill some of the the fantastic work that that person Had previously done. I think you're right if there was no budget cuts We would not be doing it if our budget got a little better. We'd be clawing that position back as well Um, but as we look to move to the block schedule and all the pieces around covid schooling for next year We felt like for the adjustment counselor knowing that the expectation is that middle schoolers from you I'm not talking about the desi piece is that middle schools are in school full year next year You know while we're able to keep that position vacant this year as students. We're mostly remote or all remote We don't feel like we could cut mental health services to students Just felt like couldn't do it and the dance piece. I know there was a lot of um public interest in but for us It was also about making sure that our middle school and high school had the electives they needed That particularly focused on movement as movement is Sort of needed. I think the public comment tonight was was spot on in terms of some of the concerns around that And also making our schedule work that the dance class does have a fair number of students in if it continues to maintain that Then we feel like it's a viable position But there's no good solution. I could pick a number of other things on this List that also have pretty significant implications as well But that is a really painful one. I'm glad you highlighted it and it's one that we really are struggling with Any other questions? I'm not seeing any more so we can move on to assessment method All right, so I think I'll I'll uh, it'll take a moment to slide to the correct While you're bringing up that let me just give an overview on another topic one of our member towns um reached out and asked us if we would host a Meeting the desk for desi to come in. Um, it's actually a really good segue to this topic To do an explanation of the statutory method So that the other towns would understand better of what goes into the statutory method I did reach out to a couple other towns There was just bluntly not a tremendous amount of interest in some of the member towns and having that I think there was some consensus that they understood the statutory method and whether they agreed with it or not It wasn't a lack of understanding. It was about whether It was about whether they agreed the statutory method is fair or unfair So I know one one of the towns and I'll just be clear. It's shoots very reached out to me to ask about that A couple other towns I spoke to did not seem interested in telling me before I'm not because they don't Like the statutory method just didn't feel like it was the best use of time Uh around that but if the committee is interested in hosting some uh a meeting Desi is willing we did talk to dug and I did talk to desi and they are willing to come out To explain the statutory method. Um, so we certainly could do that But the feedback I was getting from other member towns is It wasn't about the data or how the statutory methods put together. It's really At a core principle of whether everyone should pay the same amount per student or whether any method that takes into account Ability to pay should be accepted. So again, just something for the committee to think about If you want to take a leadership role at this point, I'm not hearing consensus from the towns that that would be the most beneficial Part of thinking about assessment methodology. So I don't know if there's any input folks would have You know, but I wanted to be at least communicate that that was a request from one one member community and I think a fair request But I'm not hearing a lot of interest in that another member towns Um Because I think they feel like they have a clear sense of statutory method and that's not the point of the Perhaps disagreement about methodology I don't know if the committee has any thoughts. I mean the committee the shoots very rep said that they could you know And I talked to desi. They're happy to come to shoots very and just do that for shoots very and invite anyone else Um, but from the district, I also bluntly think that there's a number of things we're managing at the moment Um and hosting a forum I'm not sure, uh, how much bandwidth everybody has For getting deep into the weeds of the statutory method at this moment in time But if there's feedback from the committee, I'm happy again the will of committee To engage in that Like my sense is we we have plenty of meetings and discussions. So unless somebody um, committee member feels Strongly on this topic Um, and I would also wonder about the timing. Does it need to happen? Is it something that we could sort of parking lot for for future conversations? Um, rather than this budget year Mr. Demley, did you have a Yeah, um, so I'm going to wrap this up and I'll try to keep my comments brief. Um, so no I don't think it's a good idea to have or be would be productive to have Such an hourly focused conversation And I don't think an even more broadly focused, uh, discussion on this topic Right now for the reasons that Mr. McDonald mentioned like we don't have the bandwidth right now However, I do think that it would be beneficial At some time before the end of the school year. So before say, you know, July comes for us to pencil in Even if it happens during the summer a regional school committee led Discussion on the future of of the regional assessment method And in a kind of a fundamentally different way than just this is regional assessment working group version 976 or whatever it is But that's something that starts from The principles that we know that there is disagreement among our member towns about what is fair We also know it were that our member towns are unlikely To come to unanimous agreement about what is fair However, we can't just keep going on like this which is lurching from crisis to crisis. It's not good For the member towns. It's not good for the district in terms of our time spent and um, You know in the in the health of of of the district and so we need to figure out a compromise and I think Um, I think that's most properly led by their regional school committee. Um, Not that we know like not that we need 50 more meetings But like but something a little more focused than hey, let's let's try and go find this magical Solution where everybody agrees like we we've we've we've done work to the determinants towns are not going to agree What's fair? So what is is there a consistent steady state that we could that we could achieve consensus? on I think that is really um the the next the next step because otherwise We're just gonna it's gonna be next december and we'll have our first budget presentation next fiscal year And we'll have a meeting of similar tone till last year, which I don't think we would be would be great. So thank you Okay, um, I see your I see your hand is up Yeah, I just I I want to agree um underline repair what mr. Demling was saying. Yeah I think we we need to do more work in the I I want to say off season for the budget to really work on this because um The every year struggle is just so challenging um It I just it something needs to change something needs to give And I I would agree too that I don't think it's a lack of understanding of the different methods. It's really Um, just how it all comes together and the ability for the different towns to pay and We need to figure something out To hopefully smooth that out a bit. So I just want to I want to I don't want to say that a second that but I really do hope that That as a group with all the towns we can talk in in Much more and not just like in december Yeah, so I can bring that back. Um, I would I would say I concur that um with what's been shared and And I do think having conversations before we get into the next fiscal year Next fiscal year's budget anyway is going to be really critical because once we're in the budget we're in the budget and and our ability to speak abstractly is Low Because because that's not how budget systems work So I'll definitely share that back with the person who reached out in a very friendly way for me from shoots very I mean it was it came from a very friendly place Um, I think there's some acknowledgement given today's news particularly from desi that are built it up To take on additional projects at the moment is going to be a little limited At least I'll say that from the staff end, but I think I can I think the school committee end matches that Um, but that we will try to gather the group You know at some point, you know For the end of the summer anyway, we can make that commitment To really dig deep into this topics before we get into the the discussions of a future fiscal year So thank you for that feedback You know, I was going to bring up a superintendent update But I felt because we had the budget hearing seemed more more appropriate to bring it up in the context of an agenda item Then the update so I know it's a bit of a Not a non sequitur. It's a bit of a tangent But give dr. Slaughter enough time to take a look and share some updated information and some new numbers Actually, uh, given some changes that we've received from one of our member towns A couple different options for you to look at that you have yet to see and this is fresh hot off the press Um Finished this afternoon because we got new budgetary information. I don't know right around the desi time like I don't know early afternoon It was a very busy afternoon today. Uh, this case. It was more positive news, uh, frankly than the desi information But um, so this is not in packets because it was not available Until this afternoon this evening That's right. And so so uh At it, you know about a quarter to two I think the the the information from desi came out about two o'clock. So needless needless to say Uh, the superintendent had a few different things to juggle. Uh, fortunately, I was able to to uh Take the good news from from the town of aimers as far as their ability to support our budget and sort of plug it into This this sort of this slide and the next one that will give us some indication of of You know, sort of what happens to the assessments relative to that So so the town of aimers informed us that they would be able to support about a 2.1 percent increase Uh in the current year's uh assessment Whereas previously it had been around one and a half percent was kind of the limit of what they could do and so in Uh taking that and kind of back solving it into into, uh, this revenue projection You can see the sort of results of that and so what happens is um What what we did for simplicity's sake was to to reduce the amount of school choice We would utilize which effectively makes our operating budget a little larger So that number on the very top line across the board It's the same in each of those is is now different. It's uh increased in this particular example It's about 125 000 dollars larger. Uh, and the way that cascades through And I would say take a particular look on this this slide in in the blue category or teal kind of category Uh, we targeted the 55 uh to get to Amherst at a 2.1 percent increase in their assessment and you can see the the the resulting changes to the To the other assessments for everyone, of course because the operating budget went up a little bit And relative to what we've been looking at, uh, it's still less than the current year but but not as much less But everyone's assessment went up Uh A little bit as a result of that more for some than others by virtue of the nature of the The combination of factors in our in the assessment method But I wanted to to point out that's really the particular slot column within this this Slide that I'd like you to take a moment review relative to what you had in your packet And and in some sense is what we've been looking at over the last several weeks relative to assessments And so think about that in in in that regard As a parallel to that i've created a second slide which we'll switch to in just a moment But I want to give you a chance to review this one. Uh, we did the same exercise, but with the 65 percent Being at the increase to amherst at 2.1 percent Um, that's a a change in in our operating budget a little over 100,000 about 104,000 dollars is what that that works out to In other words, we can afford by virtue of that increase we can afford a budget That's a little higher by about 100,000 104,000 dollars. And so Uh, and I'll switch to that slide Yep, and as you're switching dug, um, just want to mention that one of the painful parts of this was Uh, we would love to have clawed back some of the positions and we're making a decision that we think Uh, I don't have confidence that we won't be having this conversation again next year And I think that's shared between me and dr. Slaughter And so we're we're trying to with this revenue once we came up with this cuts list instead of restoring cuts Try to preserve some funds so that it softens what what potentially will be our budget In the next fiscal year and that's something we could definitely take feedback on but as we looked at it Uh, we we thought it was wise to With unexpected revenue um Kind of make sure we're a little more stable footing financially as we head into the next fiscal year As opposed to kind of rolling the dice more than we are in terms of you know choice and some other revenue sources. So, um Doug, I'm sorry to interrupt your flow, but I think you can describe version b of that and and why we came up with a different version of it Right. So so in this one, you know in in uh, in the last four towns meeting, you know, the the the folks uh from chute parade Had expressed, you know an interest in being much more Moving toward a fully statutory method. So in in that regard, uh, I think the the 65 percent was potentially the Sort of low end of what they thought might be Uh, where their target would be uh, relative to what we're showing at the time Obviously the numbers have have changed since then but so in this circumstance What we've done is the 65 percent sort of the terra cotta color the middle of the screen Uh, has the Amherst, you know, uh increase 2.1 percent higher than than the current year's assessment And then there's the of course the uh, the changes to the others as a result of that as well um And again, it's it's uh, you know the impacts relative to each Each community is a little different based on the fact that it's a 65 percent method instead of 55 percent method But it does, you know afford A little higher budget and therefore as as we said a sort of preserving of of resources for next fiscal year that That we thought was an appropriate and prudent sort of choice, uh for for this kind of a change So I think that uh, you know, I'll give you a moment to look at those and certainly I'm happy to answer any questions Anyone has at this point having looked at those two things You know the the the change to to Amherst to go to 2.1 percent is a a little over a hundred thousand dollar increase Uh in in their assessment is the sort of raw number uh The changes for any individual community is you know, sort of vary between like propellants between 5500 and You know Little over six thousand dollars increase in those two scenarios. We're we're frozen here for lever It's about 8600 to almost 13 thousand dollar increase and then uh for shoots very it's a uh 10,600 up to about 15700 so those are the kind of changes that we're talking about relative to what we've seen on the slides you had before um, that's a bit of the blur of numbers there, but but again, it It is uh, they are different than what I've shared with with uh, you know broadly and publicly in in the packet, but also um, some of the the town administrators have reached out for for numbers and so I've shared those and this is different than that So I'll have to reshare relative to that but but certainly uh, your thoughts and feedback on this is important to the supernative myself and so I'd love to hear if you had any questions or comments relative to this um, I have I see your hand, mr. Demling, but um I'm gonna use my position to talk first um I'm having a hard time But it took me a while to sort of wrap my brain around how we sort of have a 300 thousand dollar gift in in health insurance savings that then but then translates to You know more more cuts on this cuts required line right because before it was 1 million at 1.2 million So I was able to wrap my brain around that but now you're saying that we have more revenue um, and so Like we have a hundred thousand dollars more in revenue and yet We're still still looking at that 1.2 million dollars in in cuts Where did that where does that 100 000 show up? And then my second question is what's I I didn't follow what the difference is between version a and version b in terms of revenue But where is that where is that revenue? Right, so so the uh, the the thing I will express to you is in the in the circumstances with with uh, in both case a and b Uh, what I've done is altered the the sort of top line the operating budget So that was in your packet 33 million 9777 dollars And if you look at this version This number 33 million 113 777 is an increase of about 104 thousand dollars On the previous slide, which I'll switch back to for the moment This increases 125 thousand dollars. And so what that increase in the in the operating budget does is it it When all other things in this section, you know, sort of stay the same is that this total amount to be assessed goes up Uh by roughly 120 you know by the 125 thousand dollars And so more money needs to be assessed and so because a community said we have more available for assessment We're essentially passing that through the through the calculation to the the amount to be assessed Um But it is a bit of an inverse bit of logic that we have a savings and it becomes it shows up in a reduction section So the thing to think is that there are cuts and there are reductions and it's a reduction in costs. So those Reduce our overall number which in in turn, you know, could have been shown in this in this operating budget line we have Chosen to show it in in in this section in the uh in the cuts required. It really should say cuts slash reductions section whereas the change that that were, you know, in Putting in place relative to an increase, you know resources available from the from the member towns were essentially showing in this this this top line now I could have put it in the other one, but it's it's sort of a bit of a Zero-sum game in the in the regard to how it's impact. So it would be the same as taking You know in this particular slide take 125 thousand dollars off of that So it's the same as saying. Oh, well, then the cuts are One million 75 thousand dollars It has the same effect on the on this section where the where the assessments play out I chose not to do that because the the the particular item we were thinking about is is school choice which is sort of not it doesn't sit on the On the sort of ads and cuts list we could have put it that that place I just felt to be consistent with what I've done in the past. I would I would keep it there and in that Operating budget side. It's it's a bit of semantics in some ways, but So What the decision or the proposal that you're bringing forth is that rather than Reduce the number of cuts that we're making this year With that we're going to keep that For for next year. So I guess that's sort of the connecting the dots. I'm not sure how I'm sort of making another way to say it would be that We had originally budget, you know plan to use 600 thousand dollars worth of school choice To support the budget and what that does is that's sort of built into the operating budget It doesn't end up on our ads cuts sort of list So that 600,000 of support from school choice Reduces the number on that top line of this chart Um, and so if we use less of it that makes our operating budget go up a little bit But it also preserves in our sort of school choice bank account. It preserves that money In the balance for for use later Thank you. That's helpful Mr. Demme Yeah, um, I'm glad you asked that question because I'm still kind of confused on it And I'm sure I'm I'm confused about how I'm going to explain to somebody. Oh, hey amish went up from one and a half to 210 All right, great. What was the effect? Oh, we cut another 200,000 dollars from the budget Like wow good going school committee. Um, so it's it's really confusing The way it's laid out and I know it's probably maybe in like finance land This is more accurate, but it's it's it doesn't make It's really hard story to understand. Um, so I'm not Uh, so I guess I'm just trying to rephrase what what miss mcdonnell just said Would it be accurate to say that the effect the net effect of amherst increasing its its, um Assessment from one and a half to 210 Is is that we are going to take a hundred thousand dollars less from school choice Therefore we're going to have more available from school choice in next year's budget In other words, we've it's it's bought us a hundred thousand dollars More possible support next year's budget. Is that is that accurate? That is correct. Okay, sweet. Um, Thank you, um So the difficulty in displaying it is that what we don't show on here on this on this particular slide is those uh, that particular type of of Uh, other support for the budget. This is primarily focused on things that fall into what's called the general fund so things that are in revolving fund accounts like school choice monies like, um Transportation reimbursement et cetera et cetera oftentimes. I mean transportation is on here But we actually still put it into a revolving fund for the same idea We've traditionally not chosen to show school choice in the same way because I'm not sure exactly why we could put it on a line in the revenue section in some respects In much the same way we we have it traditionally We tend to hold that and and display that differently in our budget. And so that's that's the difficulties It doesn't it doesn't visibly show up in here Uh, you know, it is in as direct a way as as some of the other things Then follow up is because I asked us on this Kenny Okay, go ahead. So dr. Marsh just real quick. Um, so the increase from one and a half to 210 from amherst is obviously very welcome News of not expecting nine o'clock at night. So this is great to hear. Um, was there any Story or explanation given? I'm very grateful for that. Um, you know, we've obviously been an issue for a while You know, it's really appreciate that. I didn't I didn't know if there was any background to that Um, the email that I got indicated that um, some financial situations or conditions of amherst improved where they were able to extend it not just to the regional district but to other Departments as well and unless dr. Slaughter has more information Um, I tend to ask more questions when the numbers go down than when they go up So, uh, maybe that's human nature. Maybe it's an error on my part But uh, I skipped ahead when I saw the numbers going up and I'm used to seeing them go the other way and be asking lots of questions So, uh, that's as much as I have for you. I want to be clear. This came from staff at the town It did not come from the town council But I did express to both Sean and paul that we did have a regional school committee Meeting tonight if there's going to be any shifts that we really needed to have it in time for the hearing And they they beat the deadline. So thank you to Uh, the staff of the town of amherst for doing that quick work. Um, so that we could share this accurate information with you tonight And not have a significant change before you all are asked to vote on this And it's seeker I'm really curious about process for this for How do we get to what we're voting on in in two weeks from now? um from this Yeah, so, um, it's a great question because that's exactly where I was going to go now that we got more of the clarification on the Uh, the way parentheses work and in school district budgets, which uh, can be confusing to all of us Um, so, you know, I think the budget amount, you know, you see here But I think the big question is that we do need to get feedback from the committee Um, because we have two budget versions One has, you know, as dr. Sutter mentioned a 55 method that we would be recommending if we Kind of the one that you're seeing now in the blue and if you're able to forward to version b dug Um, if you're able to skip back to that at this one, you know, you know, there's not a huge difference But we would, you know, probably be able to do the 65 method the terracotta Um, there's not a huge difference between those in our budgets. Um, you know another question I'm getting and we're going to have another four town meeting We could, um I'll leave it there. Um, but, um You're gonna have to vote not just on a dollar amount, which is slightly different on these two models But also an excessive methodology Um, I don't have a great sense of what will pass every town, right? You all were at the same four budget four town budget meeting than I was You know, we've been talking about 55 percent Uh for a while as a compromise, right? There were towns at that meeting that said 45 percent is the most We should really be using the regional agreement method There was another town that said we really need to move towards statutory. So, you know, in my head if you can flip back to version a Um, dr. Slaughter started to make you go back and forth This felt about right that the 55 percent method, you know, would be would be better Um, you know, I think it's a reasonable compromise from my perspective Um, you know, I think we could you know do our work to try to convince the towns But I don't know if there's towns that are right now saying, I don't know if I can get 55 percent pass There's other towns that say there's no way we'll bring up 65 percent, you know So I think we are I don't know and I want to be honest that I would love to think that a four town meeting would resolve that difference I am not convinced of that. Um So, you know, I think we are looking for feedback because what we want to bring to you in two weeks Is a final budget that you can vote both in terms of assessment methodology As well as the total budget amount and so, you know, the difference between these two isn't great And it's really reflected in some of the choice piece and how much budget we're going to use from that But it's much more about what do we think? We'll get uh, move forward in our communities. Um And that that's really the challenge we have now You know, I think we're open to feedback in the ads cuts But I think we've talked about that at length at multiple meetings It's really about the assessment methodology and what we can do and I'm sorry to give you more choices In some ways we were thinking do we even give version b? Uh, but we felt like transparently both for you and members of the public that I think, you know We will roll with what you all choose and we wanted to give you options so that you can make the best choice So, you know, I think the two things to look at are version a here the 55% method and then If the committee really wanted to go to 65%, you know, we we had what that looked like with amherst 2.1% um But I have a lot of concerns about um going to 65 and it not passing in some of our member communities Just to be honest with you with the feedback We've heard continue to hear from now these two of our member communities So that's the kind of feedback we're looking for is, you know Are there are there leanings are there perspectives that people want to share so that we can come back and recommend one particular method for For our next meeting in two weeks. So hopefully that helped me see her So I saw um, I'm going to apologize to miss Kenny because when I called on mr. Demling miss Kenny did have her hand up and and you your image your thumbnails are right next to each other And so I went just geographically to miss Um, so um, I see three hands. I'm miss Kenny then mr. Sullivan and then miss seager Has another question You're muted miss Kenny. Sorry. Um, no problem about that. I have I'm sorry. I Can hardly see it. That's why I have to look with far to the other way. It's fine. It's because I'm on my laptop Um, I do have a quick question. So so these all have 1.2 as the amount of cuts Correct. Um, and I was just looking back through our my notes from previous meetings where we had um said 1 million in cuts. Um, so did something change along those lines and then um, I also saw in that the 1.2 I think cuts ended up with Less positions being cut. I'm I'm just not following how that is working So I'll see if I can relate this out a little bit for you in in that regard and so um, so what we had was a fairly a good bit of news relative to health insurance and so We're going to get the benefit of avoiding that cost for one month and that Saves the district on the order of about three hundred thousand dollars and so that goes into our cuts and reductions list and so that made the 1 million go to 1,300,000 in cuts and reductions and so that's overall, you know, just taking it away from our budget And then we restored a couple of things which is how our fte went down to 14.9 and and so most so that sort of Stole back a bit of that. Um, so that's that's kind of how we got there and and so the You know sort of changes to person. This is all sort of Not all of it, but the piece that was beneficial news was in an area that is purely budgetary and not as much You know choices in the school building as far as personnel and classes offered that sort of thing But the restorations were and so that's that's the good bit of news even though the the overall reduction looks worse relative to the advice the location of where that happens is is a Less attached to students in there and their success in school Okay, so it's more a matter of how it plays out on paper Great same same kind of before as the the the overall budget went up even though okay to financial gymnastics Okay, all right. Thank you. And so I More along. I don't remember who asked the questions before so as procedurally so the school committee not only votes on the overall budget but then also the assessment method and then what We as a group decide then goes back to the four towns. So we're I just want to make sure I'm understanding things correctly. So we're voting on the the dollar figure and how then that gets Figured out between the four towns That's correct. Okay. All right. Thank you We'll have motion language sorry Mr. Sullivan Yeah, sorry. I missed so much of the meeting. I was hanging out with the shoots very select board finance committee and school committee and That the three boards individually took votes to decide that They're gonna stand firm at the 65 statutory with a five-year ruling average. That's their stand for this budget season Mr. Seeger, sorry. I was muted I'm taking a second here to absorb what mr. Sullivan just said Because I honestly think that a 65 percent will not get passed lever it um that I very What I heard from the select board and finance committee there during your four towns meeting is is That that that's not the direction that ultimately we would want to get to in terms of assessments And I won't speak for other member towns on what I heard that day um lever it's interested in the 45 percent I personally as a rep here and being in support of education Um, I personally would support the 55 percent. I actually I like version a um So I think it's going to be an interesting here. Um it's Uh, what what I so so all of that being said and I'm on what mr. Sullivan said about what happened in shoots very tonight Can you clearly tell us what happens when With there's two separate things if the assessment doesn't pass what town Any of the towns? What's the default assessment and then separately if the budget Doesn't pass one of the towns now. I think I'm a little clearer on that that we we sort of get bumped to um Probably like a 112th the state comes in and helps us out there, but what happens in each scenario You want to take this dog? You want me to do it go ahead? Okay, so we had a conversation with the state. I don't know two weeks ago Everything blends together, right? Um, and we got some clarity. It was very helpful very clarifying conversation. So what happens is Um, if it's any part of it fails to vote it comes back to you all and the school committee can choose to Keep the same budget and re-vote the same buzz it it can choose to change the budget It could choose to keep the same assessment methodology Or do what it likes with it. So the first step is if there's a failed budget In either by assessment method or budget it doesn't really actually it's sort of arbitrary because If we don't have a shared assessment method, then we have a failed budget anyway. Um, so We got that clarified. That's really more semantics than anything else. It comes back to the committee for your consideration If we get to july We don't have a past budget which given the date of town meetings Is likely that we wouldn't have time actually to pass a new budget and actually have the towns re-vote on it With the exception of the town of amers Then we do go into a one-twelfth budget which the big commissioner sets our budget And also sets the assessment methodology as statutory. So they wanted that was clarified For us that that it was we'll revert to a statutory method Last year was a little different because a lot of the one-twelfths budgets that were formed weren't because towns couldn't get along It's because they literally couldn't have their town meetings. So last year there was some flexibility and that only confused matters But that was clarified for us directly And then, you know, there's a lot of they the desi tries to support districts regional districts with working with member towns To try to get to a place of resolution Um On a practical matter our budget is As you see going down Uh I think it's unlikely our budget would go down more, you know, we they can't promise anything But they do look at they put a lot of weight on what school committees vote for what communities need for funding So we can't guarantee anything but I asked very direct questions around that I also want to be honest that some of our member towns are really raising if we do a failed budget this year They want to talk and we heard this at the four town meeting. So it's not it's not my opinion Um, I quite like our district Um But there's going to be some real conversations about what we want to do long term similar to what mr. Demlin said earlier Although with a different different bent for sure if we don't have a past budget And so, you know, I think on a practical matter desi sets the budget If if they they perceive that the school committee has voted a reasonable budget They generally, you know, don't want to Overrule school committees on that it's not a guarantee. Uh, it definitely goes back to the statutory method Um, and then they you know, they expect communities sort of working out if it continues into the fall into november That's where things shift a bit with desi becoming, you know, more heavily involved in trying to resolve matters There are some districts that are trying to read, you know Unregionalized now. Uh, we ask that question because some of our towns have asked us Can we unregionalize if we're unhappy? Uh, that does involve the commissioner's approval and it is a multi-year process Um, but it can't happen Again, i'm far from advocating for that, but I think it is relevant information to share with the committee and the community Um, that there there are some people talking about that if we don't get to a better place because every year We seem to be in the same place Of which is trying to do one-year agreements and and lots of conservation. So that's not critiquing any town at all That's just trying to very plainly share with you the implications of a failed budget both In terms of desi's next steps and then the political ramifications that our communities may engage with so Stakes are really high You know, it's not just because i'm really tired and that i'm being uh that i'm saying that i'm This is Very real to our member towns. It's it's becoming A touch point in all of our member towns The sense of frustration that we cannot get to we have some really different opinions about what fairness means Uh about assessments and I think everyone coming from a good place I think everyone's trying to support schools and I think everyone's trying to do the thing that they think is fair Uh, you'll not hear me critique a specific town for having a specific opinion. I think there's validity all around My frustration is that we can't get anything consistent and desi's frustration, frankly, is that we can't get anything consistent They expect communities to have the same method More or less year and you're out and we never do and yeah, I don't think I've had this my fifth year in the job I don't think we've had the same assessment method For any period of two years in those five years and we certainly won't this year. Um, so again, sorry for my Uh bluntness and candor 930 I'm a little tired. It's been a day But I want to answer your question directly and share that's that's sort of the next steps that we have here You know, I think I'm not sure what the right compromise is and I'm not sure there's one that every community will support You know, um, that's not a critique of shoots very mr. Sullivan. I want you to to know that I appreciate you sharing it back It's not a critique of lebrate Uh, the seager I think, you know, you're you're representing your town and talking about that. It's not a critique of any of the towns Um, but if if 10 percent This year is going to be a determining factor of failing a budget. I think there's going to be some some pretty significant Uh conversations that happen on the tail end of that that bring lots of major large-scale questions to to task For the community. So, you know, in my sense, I hope we can come to a place where we Say, you know, can we compromise for a year? Can we meet in the spring and and we've been through this before? But if we can't we can't and You know, it's starting to feel a little bit like we might be there and that we can't place And that's a big concern of mine. It's a big concern of the education We provide to students and I'll put the soapbox that's been Up on my desk too often today I'll put it down so that you can continue the conversation, but just wanted to answer that one completely One other thing I'll add just mechanically regarding the the sort of failed budget scenario is that uh, you know the the as as the superintendent indicated the the state is Is definitely going to exert a greater level of pressure on us And it certainly worked with us to try to get resolved with the four communities to get to a budget If we're not in in that circumstance But if we get to the end of december They they sort of take our choice away So they you know sort of by fiat the commissioner decides what it is And we all have to live with whatever that choice is as of december So that's that's a that's a boundary that is worth knowing as well You know is for us the mechanics of how how it works Regarding, you know a difficulty in coming to a budget any other Questions comments Mr. Deming So dr. Mars just real quick in terms of Going out the sequence there of a failed budget if it comes back to us Yet technically we could revote something and presented the four towns, but you're saying that That that schedule wise since that would require a new town meetings Right if i'm not mistaken in in three of our member towns to then reconvene And re-approve that's very unlikely to happen by june 30th. Is that is that a fair restatement? Yeah, and especially because I believe at least some of the member towns are meeting a little bit later than they typically Dr. Slaughter any of the members from the three towns could correct me, but I think some of the town meetings Are not quite in the typical schedule Timeline, but maybe i'm making that up. So if I am, you know, someone can correct me, but Doug, do you have that I believe shoots berries meeting june 12th I've not heard of any of the others moving from their traditional timeframe But I believe it was shoots very they indicated that they were meeting a little later this year Um, which, you know, if they meet june 12th and so then we you know, there's roughly two weeks left in june at that point If if if there's not a budget miss seager Uh levered is meeting me first from what I understand right now. Um What i'm curious about is is What other people think too Um, and maybe I can't ask that question Um But i'm curious because I feel like Uh, I know where the levered officials stand and I know this way at town meeting and how that can go Um, and I don't think there's anything that I can do about that, you know, no matter what I support here Um, I find it personally incredibly frustrating that one town is is kind of pushing us in one direction. I'll be honest Um, I understand it. I understand the different scenarios Um, but I find that incredibly frustrating instead of trying to find some sort of compromise for Across all of us, but I am I'm truly curious about if other people Want to talk what they're thinking as well Miss dancer Um, I believe that for pelham the the finance committee I think and somebody can correct me if they think i'm wrong indicated that they could go with the 55 and um Maybe the 65 as it's revised Well, they wouldn't have seen the 65, but that that's Where pelham stands and um Yeah Mr. Sullivan, do you have air of hand raised? I did and then I took it down. So yeah to speak to Miss Seeger's piece, you know, I This is coming from you know, I'm like you I'm appointed to this committee and I have to Do what, uh, you know, what is pointed to me And but I will say that for some in shootsberry the thought is that statutory is Is the way to go and that the other three towns are negotiating away from that And so that's where that the difference in opinions is coming from Mr. Deming Yeah, so I don't have one solution that I think Um, we should vote on right now. We obviously will have to vote in a couple weeks. Um My my point of view from a regional school committee perspective the way I approach this topic is Is I kind of take my amherst resident hat off a little bit and I say my obligation is to Find a way for the four towns to support a budget for next fiscal year And so that's really the only lens that I'm evaluating these options for which which which are the colors Which are the many multiple rainbow colors has the greatest chance of achieving Consensus, right? It might not be 50 chance. But which but which which are these slices Has the greatest chance of of of getting passed at all four Towns and right now it doesn't seem like there's anything outside of the 55 65 or maybe it's 60 That that is going to do that and that that's where I think that comes down. Um Uh, so I kind of take it's not that I don't respect what Members of my town are saying about what they prefer and it's not that I don't have my own personal opinion About what I think is fair Um, but I just I sort of have to shelf that I at least that's the way I approach this topic You know the other thing that that that relates to the to the previous thing of Hey, shouldn't we kind of figure out a long-term solution to this is that I do think If if we are you know now openly talking about you know potential existential threats to the region Because that's what this is right if we If we if we fail a budget and we go to 1 12th And then you know the grumblings and rumors of breaking up the region really bubble to the surface and people start you know, then the region could break up and um I'm it's not on the agenda. So I'm not going to talk about it one way or the other but I feel like um, I feel like again just with the regional school committee hat on the responsibility is to say regional school committee takes ownership of this conversation And acknowledges those things that we have now worked towards which is not everybody is ever going to agree on what's fair And we can't keep doing this forever. Therefore. What is the best shot consensus for the future? That's probably not something that we can cook up in two weeks the long-term solution to assessment method um But but maybe we can cook up some kind of a statement or commitment or declaration of regional school committee ownership to solve To doing our best shot at solving the problem in relatively short order um, you know spring ish spring slaps some summer ish, but I think absent that you're going to get Four fiefdoms that are all have very legitimate Points of view about what is fair and and and never one Central force driving them forward because that's what I think is really lacking right now There is no one central force that is moving that conversation. We just sort of Lurch reactionary wise, um budget to budget Um, so it'll be a hard conversation Next week to try and pick what the most likely Slice of color is that's going to achieve consensus but um, I think we could increase the percent chance that it gets received favorably if if if we combine it with some kind of a Of a statement or a declaration or commitment on our part to to also be practically solving the long-term problem I um personally share sort of that perspective of of um Taking my amherst hat off. I mean I come to it from amherst obviously that um But thinking about my role as a regional school committee member And advocating for the regional school district and so thinking through what's the best outcome Or most likely to pass outcome that we can strive for I at this hour, um I I don't have an answer or perspective on that. I don't think I could answer that if you asked me so I um Uh, we'll we'll come back to that. Um, two weeks will be voting on On the budget and the assessment method in two weeks. Um, I think the um Best we can do is to try to Collect with this new information. I mean we didn't we weren't able to see this Until tonight. It's good Great that we have like the most up-to-date information But I don't think that we've been able to sit with it either on terms of what those different assessment methods mean um Just trying to think um Do we have that discussion next week or do we have to come into next week meeting and knowing exactly what that assessment method is We can have that discussion. Yeah. No, I mean, I think we'll have we can have multiple, you know Doug can have multiple motions for your consideration So that you can choose the one you want. I think that would be that'd be okay. I'm looking at Yeah, absolutely. So if we're going to use some sort of, you know of the Um percentage based statutory, you know, we can leave the percentages, you know unknown and you can fill in the blank as it were Um in the motion language, but obviously there there are other options available so we can we'll bring um A few different choices for you to to uh to review and and vote on Yeah, and I think that might be helpful is also the sort of Each of these rainbow charts is is helpful to sort of see the different Um operating budget assumptions and what that what how that water calls to the assessment method But if if what you're recommending on version a is the 55 method and on version b the 65 Method might be helpful to have a slide that sort of puts just those to all those columns um Next to each other so we can eyeball them easily without you asking you to go back and forth for these slides um Ms. Dancer you had your hand up um So are we going to get a copy of what you've shown us tonight the version a and the version b and and actually when we get to the Agenda planning I would like to request that we deal with the budget before we deal with other items because this The stuff about the high school is going to be ongoing and this we have to do And I'd like my brain to be as clear as it can be when we're talking about this next time I think that's a reasonable request Ms. Seager I'm very much interested in what mr. Demling talked about earlier about Having some sort of statement of commitment to looking at these methods. I think that would go a long way especially in in leverant to To help go through this budget season. I mean, I'm hopeful that it'll go a long way And I hear you both when you're talking about having your regional cap on and my focus sitting here is what's best for the students Knowing too that when I go to town meeting and the finance committee and the select board have shared their opinions publicly It can be very challenging So I just want to say too that I'm thinking here like what's best for the students that we pass some numbers Not even worrying about the assessment that we use we've passed numbers. We move this year along and we keep everything functioning But and I think a statement would help too that like yes, we as a committee are going to focus on this problem The larger problem. Yep Not seeing more hands. So I'm sensing agreement on that on that approach and we can sort of Also be prepared with what that statement address what that statement looks like when we come back to it into Dr. Slatter Just before you shift agenda topics There is another piece too Are the budget you have to prove in a couple weeks and that's capital So I just want to mention it and and you know, it's to your you It's your decision as to how level of what level of detail we go into but that What I will say to you is that the section of this presentation that's in your packet didn't change in You know the afternoon This afternoon I should say but it did change previous from the previous one that I We looked at a week or two ago. I've lost track of the dates. I think a week ago. I had something or two weeks ago We had Discussed capital a little bit and and what's in your packet is slightly different. We've refined it a bit more um, and so that that will be worth Going into a little bit more detail perhaps in two weeks or tonight, whichever you choose But I didn't want to note that before before we potentially moved on to to your your next topics Think potentially In two weeks would be Better for us to come back at that because we're pushing 10 o'clock and no absolutely and and I think you know It didn't change drastically from what you saw before But it is uh, it is worth, you know, taking a review and thinking about the questions you might have about it And then we can we can probably deal with it next next time for sure Great Are folks okay with that plan? Yeah, okay Great, thank you um, so we have I'm just going to ask the question. Um, I think Please next um the next item can be quit, but I'm just and yeah, okay, so let's just keep going Next item is school choice vote Yeah, so recommended the last meeting given how much school choice Income we're using which, you know, hopefully, you know, as dr. Salter said, we're trying to reduce that but that's the reality That when there are open seats, um That we accept school limited number of school choice students I will say that because the our Enrollment is fluctuated so much in the last year It's probably going to be a relatively late decision to accept choice students I don't think we'll be accepting choice students In the month of june for instance because we won't be certain of what our Enrollment numbers will look like but once we get to august and we have more clarity If there are empty seats, I think it will help financially and choice students as we've talked about multiple times bring A lot of other perspectives that we really value to our school districts so the recommendation would be to Continue or to be a school choice school district for the 2021-2020 school year and that's all I have to say unless there's further questions on that Is there a specific um Way that that motion has to be worded So I think any committee member could move that the Amherst Pellum regional school district Except school choice students in the 2021-2022 school year I Move that the Amherst Pellum regional school district accept school choice students for the 21-22 school year second Kenny is there any discussion Seeing none, so we'll move to a roll call vote Mr. Demling Demling I Mr. Harrington Harrington I Miss Kenny Kenny I Miss Lord Lord I Miss Beeger Seeger I Miss Spitzer Spitzer I Miss Dancer Answer I Mr. Sullivan Sullivan I And McDonald's I The motion passes unanimous 9-0. Thank you Um, and now we have a future agenda planning um And our handy dandy planner document is in our packet I think page 78 I'm in the packet um Our next meeting as we mentioned a few times is the 23rd. So two weeks from tonight. So we have um our budget and budget and assessment method vote which will include capital Questions and discussion on capital and vote Um and permanent stanzas request. We'll start with that um We'll have an update on the high school um Planning for a full in-person return Um, we also have spring season athletics Because that season will be starting while we are still in full remote. Um, it will require us to weigh in on that um, and then TBD Um is a c-pack annual report presentation. So I don't know if Mr. Demling, you're the rep. I don't know if you have Uh any insight as to whether they will be ready for that kind I don't I think they were flexible based on our requirement. Okay So I will um kind of back with them. Are there Uh other topics Mr. Demling So Dr. Morris middle school return of in-person. Um, that was obviously affected by the desi guidance today And I hear you on the high school team needing two weeks I just I have to ask about Both urgency. Um, but so but I'm wondering if is it a different answer for middle school because we do have a time and date certain Both in our school committee plan in in the desi um edict For seventh and eighth About when that has to happen for middle school and in middle school while not as simple as elementary is less complicated than the high school So is is there Does it make sense to break that up and start talking about seventh and eighth next week? Or is I'm just I'm thinking about the community And their anxiousness even though, you know Sometimes we have it's a reality of of how many weeks we're going to wait and then having everything all at the same time Yeah, I mean my preference is for both for summit academy middle school and high school to come back in two weeks So the middle school's in the same boat as as many of you know, there was a server that went out yesterday asking for family Input about returning for a hybrid model that they were developing and then this happened today And so I do think I want to give principal sharon and and the staff who is working with Who had a detour Significant detour they actually were meeting today at 2 30 and and you know had to go Think about what they were going to do in this different scenario The other thing is there's a lot of shared staff between the middle school high school and summit academy So we can think of these three schools as independent but the reality is We can't really think of them independent. They're going to share bus routes. They're going to share They've shared staffing so anything one school does has implications for the other school. So My preference is to come back in two weeks. We also have an amorce meeting next week where we have a really healthy agenda There's a Pella meeting on Thursday night and at some point just capacity wise just to be really candid, you know What you're going to hear is not very satisfying if we have meetings every other day It just because we will be planning for school can be means not doing the work or doing the work and not planning for school Can be meetings and I'd like to keep that balance healthy. I know that's hard to keep that Yeah, the desi thing's not a small thing, but but I also we have a budget hearing in amorce next week You know, we have a lot of things that we have to do and palms voting on a budget on Thursday So I think when you just look at the full constellation I might rather this is usually against my constitution But I'd rather have a pretty long meeting two weeks from now than having a less satisfactory meeting Tuesday and Thursday of next week, you know, just the balance is tough and you know, three districts doesn't always make sense And this is one of those moments where, you know, we have a lot of competing interests in each of our three districts So, you know, it's all right with the committee. I'd prefer to bring all those the amor the amorce Agenda next week is pretty Healthy is a good word, but it's pretty pretty long and deep and it's going to be um another night like um tonight, so I would I'm love to add another meaty meaty topic that needs helpful attention onto that night. Um So, okay, so middle school and high school full in person and summit full in person learning Plan for the 23rd anything else it's a pretty pretty pretty full agenda Few but one key topics, um an important topic miss dancer What is you said, um budget and capital and then the return there was something after that that you mentioned also Spring season athletics, thanks. Thank you Our fourth our fourth season Okay great, um I just have one warrant So, um, I authorized by my signature the payables the amount of three hundred nine thousand two hundred nineteen dollars and thirty seven cents for the warrant dated March 3rd, 2021. This included general fund expenses of two hundred fifty seven thousand two hundred forty nine dollars and eighty three cents revolving fund expenses of ten thousand dollars Ten thousand nine hundred three dollars and forty one cents and grant fund expenses of thirty thousand three hundred fifty one dollars and sixty cents and other funds in the amount of Ten thousand seven hundred fourteen dollars fifty three cents for capital and I signed this on march 4th, 2021 Thank you Um, next we have gifts and I don't believe we have any in our packets. So, um move on to our final item Um, I will move to adjourn the um regional school committee. Is there a second? Second Move on McDonald seconded by stancer Um, and there's no discussion. Mr. Dimley Dimley I Mr. Harrington Here and can I Miss Kenny Kenny I Miss Lord Lord I Miss Seeger Seeger I Miss Spitzer Spitzer I Miss Dancer Stancer I Mr. Sullivan Sullivan I McDonald I We are adjourned Thank you everyone